A Road Untravelled
by circleofstars
Summary: Another way Devil's Trap could have ended, and the consequences of that ending.
1. Chapter 1

**A Road Un- travelled** (AU Devil's Trap ending)

John threw back his head without warning, roaring aloud as writhing black smoke spilled out of his open mouth, filling the cabin with curdling dark mist until it dissolved into the floor. When the fog had dissipated, the tension remained, almost tangible, so that Sam stood unmoving, every muscle tensed, holding his breath because he worried that if he released it he would disturb the still present creature which was, for the moment, dormant.

It was several seconds before Sam let out his long, shaky breath, and he felt the air move, releasing some of the charged atmosphere in the small room. He relaxed his fingers, allowing the revolver to drop onto the floorboards with a resounding clatter. Sam blinked, hard. _Get it together_. He shook himself mentally, and braced himself for the sight he would be faced with when he turned around.

It wasn't much worse than he had expected. Dean was still conscious, propped on his side, visibly struggling to keep his head raised and watch his brother's actions. His t-shirt was glossy with blood, and scarlet stood out brightly on his white lips. The dark pool beneath him had only grown slightly since Sam had left his side.

Sam dropped to his knees beside his brother, trying to recall long-ago first aid training, even while his head was still hazy with shock and he struggled to achieve clear, rational thought. He hovered awkwardly, holding his hands out ready to help, but afraid to touch his brother's raw, torn flesh for fear of hurting him.

Dean rolled onto his back, no longer finding the energy to hold his head up, and he flinched as he moved, letting out a shaky sigh which echoed Sam's earlier one. Dean fixed his brother's twitching, panicky ark eyes with his own glassy green stare. 'Hey,' he whispered. 'It's gonna be ok,' he assured, nodding his head slightly for emphasis. Sam swallowed.

'Yeah… yeah,' he muttered, laying a hand on his brother's shoulder, no longer sure which of them was reassuring the other.

Behind him, he heard John cough and roll over, starting to crawl towards his sons. 'Sammy…? How bad? Will he need stitches?' He grimaced. 'Hospital?'

'Ah…' Sam looked his brother up and down, wondering how his father could have any doubt. 'I'm gonna call an ambulance,' he said, squeezing his brother's shoulder before rising slowly and crossing the room to find his cell phone.

'We can drive…' protested John, crawling up to Dean and biting his lip as he took in the seriousness of the wounds.

Sam's head spun as he straightened from rummaging in his bag, and he steadied himself on the wall as the wave of nausea passed, then finally answered: 'No… I don't think that would be a good idea.'

John raised his head and inspected his younger son, noting his swollen face and lost, overwhelmed expression. 'Yeah, alright,' he agreed.

Sam dialled. The woman who picked up had a slow, soft voice, as though she was striving to sound calm in order to reassure the panicked individuals who phoned 911. However, her crooning had the opposite effect, grating on Sam's nerves, and he answered her questions through gritted teeth.

'Alright, my dear. Don't worry. They'll be with you soon. It's going to be alright, just don't you panic…'

Sam growled and slammed the phone shut, arguably harder than was necessary, then dropped it onto the cluttered table.

John was leaning against the wall beside his son, tying a strip of his shirt around his leg as a bandage. Sam felt no guilt, watching his father wince as he tightened the knot, and he wondered at himself, but knew that he had had no choice, and moreover, that his father was angry with him, not for shooting him, but for failing to shoot him. _God, my family is twisted, _he thought.

'Dad, I…'

'I'll go wait for that ambulance. This place ain't easy to spot from the road,' John mumbled, cutting him off. He rose stiffly, and limped out of the door. Sam watched him go and sighed, but a large part of him was relieved. Now, at least he could deal with his problems one at a time.Turning to the 'problem' in question, Sam finally surfaced from his shock enough for the remains of his first aid training to creep into his mind. _Put pressure on the wound. Stop the blood flow. Calm the patient. If he panics, his heart rate goes up, and he bleeds faster… _

Sam shrugged off his jacket and bunched it up, pressing it hesitantly, but with increasing strength, against his brother's chest. Dean, it seemed, was still aware, and he sucked in air through his teeth, his eyes flickering open, his face tensed with pain.

'Hey- you still with me?'

'Uh, yeah… I guess'

His voice was weary and hoarse, but Sam felt filled with warm, liquid relief at the sound of it.

'Where's Dad?' Dean asked, for the second time that night.

'He went to flag down the ambulance'

Dean frowned slightly, but nodded. 'He ok?'

'Yeah… he's pissed,' Sam admitted.

Dean's lips curved into a lopsided smile. 'He'll get over it. It was the only choice, Sammy…'

'Yeah, I know'

'You ok?'

'I'll live,' Sam answered grimly, and then amended, seeing the concern in his brother's eyes: 'Yes, I'm fine. Really, I'm ok. The last thing we need you to do right now is worry about me.'

Dean conceded this with a small nod.

'Dean, you know… the demon… it lies. It wasn't Dad, saying all that…'

'Yeah, Sam, I know,' Dean sighed. He was grateful for Sam's effort, but at that moment it was the last issue he wanted to discuss. His tone wasn't sharp, but Sam recognised his feelings, and didn't push the matter any further.

Both brothers lapsed into silence. Dean found himself concentrating on breathing, and closed his eyes to focus on this task, which became more and more difficult, as every breath aggravated his burning skin, grating his ribcage against his wounds. He could hear the air gurgling softly in his throat as more blood trickled into his ruptured lungs. _I can taste the iron in my blood_, he thought idly, recalling the demon's words from earlier. He turned his head and spat onto the dusty floor, not wanting the reminder of the metallic flavour on his tongue.

Sam looked down at his brother, pale and bleeding on the floor. _But not broken. Still not broken, _he reflected proudly.

'Hey Dean?'

His brother's eyes flickered open.

'I know you don't want to have that conversation now. But you should know: it was wrong. I need you, ok? I don't know what I'd do… So you just hang in there, ok?'

Dean half smiled again. 'Hell of a time to go sappy on me, Sammy'

'It's Sam'

David Matthews leaned forward in his seat, eyes wide, trying to penetrate the thick darkness at the edges of the road.

'The turning should be along here somewhere'

Next to him, Marie Drew nodded. She was frowning, tense, biting her lip. Working closely with her for nearly six months now, David felt that he could read her feelings fairly well.

'What's up?' he asked.

She shrugged. 'I just… it makes me uneasy, calls like this one… middle of nowhere, injuries like from a fight.' David nodded, and patted her gently on the arm in what he hoped was a comforting way. He knew Marie had had some frightening experiences in the past. This wasn't an easy job.

'Hey, is there a turning there?'

She squinted into the darkness, waiting for the headlights to reveal the opening in the trees that lined the road.

'Yeah. Must be it'

Marie swung the wheel round, skilfully manipulating the clumsy vehicle onto the narrow track. A short distance up, the headlights revealed a tall man standing in the road, and Marie braked, and then killed the engine. She shared a look with David, whose kind eyes gave her silent encouragement, then took a deep breath, opened her door and stepped down.

'Sir, did you call for an ambulance?' David asked in a professional tone.

'Yeah,' replied the man gruffly, limping away from them, towards an old black car, parked in front of a wooden cabin.

'Hang on, sir!' Marie yelped, trotting after him. 'Come on, it's ok, we need to look at that leg…'

'No… my son,' he explained, motioning her to follow him into the cabin. Somewhat calmed by the man's attitude – in shock, maybe, but not violent - Marie followed him. David walked on behind her, shuddering slightly in the warm night.

Sam sighed heavily in relief when his father opened the door, followed by a short dark woman in her thirties and a thin, sandy haired man who looked about forty. The woman grimaced slightly at the sight of the brothers, but she recovered quickly, masking her disquiet with a professional smile. The man's face remained entirely impassive.

'I'm Marie,' said the paramedic, kneeling beside Dean, and glancing across him at Sam.

'Sam… my brother, Dean,' Sam offered, the words harder to find now, as the paramedics' presence drove home the reality of the situation. He carefully pulled his sodden jacket away from Dean's chest, and winced in sympathy as his brother let out a choked gasp.

'It's ok,' soothed Marie, stroking the young man's hair with one hand, and schooling her features to remain smooth as she inspected his blood-soaked chest. _God, what happened? _she wondered, running her eyes over the swollen face of the other boy, and the older man's injured leg, which David was tending silently. However, despite the strange and suspicious circumstances, she realised that her apprehension had evaporated, leaving only pity and compassion. She worked carefully, cleaning the wounds and covering them with temporary dressings to slow down the blood flow until it could be fixed at the hospital.

The two brothers were quiet as she worked, occasionally exchanging whispered assurances. She admired their composure. Sam held his brother's hand, and murmured soft words of comfort whenever her ministrations elicited a groan from the other's throat. Dean was clearly holding onto his consciousness by a thread – _probably for his brother's benefit, _she suspected- but he smiled up at her through a haze of pain.

'You'll need to get this checked out properly when you get to the hospital,' David was saying. 'Can you follow us?' he asked Sam.

'I…'

'I' going to need space to work in the back of the ambulance, if he's going to stay alive until we get in,' he explained, bluntly.

'Yeah, ok. I'll follow with Dad'

'Sammy…'

'You sure?' Marie didn't want todisagree with her partner, but the boy seemed pretty shaken.

'Yeah. I'm over the initial… shock, now. I'll be ok'

David nodded, satisfied, and helped Marie load Dean onto the stretcher.

'Hey,' muttered Dean suddenly, more to distract himself from the pain then anything else, 'Be careful with my car.'

Sam grinned, and followed as the two paramedics carried his brother out to the ambulance. Marie climbed out again and shut the doors. Before walking round to the driver's side, she smiled at Sam, patting him on the arm.

'We'll do our best for him, honey.' Reluctant to give him false hope, she left it at that. He nodded, and then joined his father in the car.

Dean was disappointed that the female paramedic – Marie – was driving. Her kind eyes were calming, while her partner's face remained constantly indifferent, and he made no attempt to converse with his patient, leaving Dean to concentrate, again, on his own laboured, agonizing breathing. _I never knew this could be so difficult, _he reflected bitterly, inhaling carefully, trying not to move his ribs. It was getting harder to draw air through all the blood pooling in is throat.

The ambulance's motion smoothed as Marie pulled out onto the main road. 'Hang in there, alright, Dean?' she called, glancing in her mirror. Dean grunted a vague reply.

The other paramedic – David – finally turned from fiddling with the complex medical equipment above Dean's head, and looked directly at him for the first time, grinning. Dean felt his blood turn turgid and cold throughout his body. The man's eyes were a sickly, unnatural yellow.

Sam pulled out onto the road, following the ambulance's taillights.

'I'm surprised at you, Sammy, his father began. _Here we go, _Sam thought grimly. 'I thought we saw eye to eye on this… killing this demon comes first, before me, before everything.'

Sam frowned at the taillights in front of him, Marie's significant silence still echoing in his ears, and shook his head.

'No, sir. Not before everything'

His father grunted, not satisfied.

'Look,' Sam continued. 'We still have the Colt; we still have the one bullet left. We can just start over. We already found the demon once…. what the hell?'

'Oh, no… no, not you again…' Dean muttered frantically, trying to wriggle away, but finding that every movement produced an agonizing twinge, and anyway, where could he go?

'Is everything ok?' called Marie, flicking her eyes to the mirror again.

'Yeah… he's starting to panic, I think he's delirious,' replied her partner, placing restraining hands on his shoulders, and grinning down conspiratorially at Dean's wide-eyed face.

'No!' Dean choked, 'Please, pull over, help!' he begged her, uncharacteristically, despising the palpable weakness in his voice.

'It's ok, honey,' she replied calmly. Dean closed his eyes and slumped in defeat.

'You just can't win, can you, Dean?' taunted the demon quietly.

Dean opened his eyes again with great effort. 'You bastard…' he whispered.

'There's no point in your fighting… you're no match for me, even the three of you together. Not even close,' it bragged, a little too loudly.

'David…?' Marie called from the front.

'Oh, everything's fine,' it replied cheerfully, reaching into the front.

Dean gasped as a sickening crack filled the ambulance. 'No…'

The demon grinned at him again as the driverless vehicle veered off the road into the trees.

The two men's conversation was abruptly aborted as they watched, open mouthed in horror. The ambulance turned suddenly, and trundled over the edge of the road, rocking its way down the short slope before colliding violently with a thick tree trunk and coming to rest, leaning precariously against the tree.

Sam let the Impala roll to a stop at the side of the road, and climbed out. _Is this really happening?_ he wondered, dazed by the shock of one more disaster in a night full of disasters.

Dean was relieved to let unconsciousness claim him as the ambulance stopped moving in a screech of tortured metal. However, it was only a few minutes before his eyes flickered open again.

In fact, Dean's helpless position on the metal bed had protected him from the chaos caused by the crash. The paramedic's face was bruised where items falling from the cabinets had hit him, but he was still smiling, his eyes glowing hideously.

Dean felt himself seized around the shoulders by arms much stronger than they should have been: skinny, pale and freckly, yet completely immovable.

The man kicked the doors open so forcefully that one of them fell from its hinges. He dragged Dean backwards out of the ambulance, holding him around the throat and allowing his legs to drag along behind. Dean gaped desperately, but for all the air he caught in his mouth, none could get past the barrier in his throat to feed his starving lungs. He struggled feebly, clawing at the strong arm with trembling fingers, but the demon barely seemed to notice his efforts.

Darkness gathered at the edges of his vision, but he heard the car door slam, and his brother's voice yelling his name, before he passed out.

Sam stopped dead, maybe ten yards away from the possessed paramedic. Curses chased each other around his head, but he struggled to put together a coherent thought. He simply stood, frozen, staring at his brother's white face, closed eyes and bloody chest, his body, hanging limp, and his neck still encircled by an arm. _Please, please, don't be dead,_ he prayed silently.

He heard John scrambling down the slope, stopping beside him, pulling back the hammer on the Colt until it clicked, deafening in the silence.

The yellow-eyed man laughed delightedly, ducking down slightly behind his hostage so that he was entirely shielded by Dean's limp body. Golden eyes peered at them over Dean's shoulder.

'Is it worth it, John?' he chuckled. He poked Dean in the ribs with his free hand, producing a quiet, strangled moan. 'He's not dead yet.'

Sam marvelled at how relief and horror could both hit him so hard in the same second. 'Dad, no… please… not before everything,' he repeated.

'I'm sorry, Sam,' John grated, grim and determined, his hand rock steady on the gun, despite the single tear tracing a path down his grimy cheek.

'What about me?' asked the demon brightly, gesturing at its own stolen body. 'I only wanted to help. I'm an innocent bystander,' it wheedled mockingly, dwelling sneeringly on the word 'innocent'.

John's mouth twitched, but his decision was already made, and he had never in his life been persuaded against a choice he had determined. His finger tightened on the trigger, and he sent up a silent prayer for forgiveness. Then _squeezed_.

Sam, on impulse, threw himself sideways, colliding heavily with his father. The shot rang out, and discharged harmlessly into the darkness.

The demon's lips curled into a sneer, and it released Dean, who collapsed onto the ground without a sound.

'Oh dear, Sammy,' it taunted, speaking slowly, relishing every word. 'Was that the last one?'

With that, the man finally tipped back his head and spilled black writhing smoke from his mouth with an anguished cry. Then it was gone, leaving the four men in the still dark.

David the paramedic searched for the right words, but could think of nothing remotely appropriate to say. His mind was in turmoil, back in control of his body without a clue as to why, or how, or what had happened to him. After several second, he gave up trying to understand or resolve the situation and let his training take over, dropping to his knees beside the fallen man in front of him, and starting to try resuscitating him.

Sam gaped at his father as if he were a complete stranger. He even wondered whether John was possessed again, even knowing that he wasn't._ Surely it's human nature to know that life is worth more than revenge… Two lives. His son's life…_Searching his father's face, Sam could see nothing but simmering fury, and he wondered how long it had been since the hunt had claimed John's humanity.


	2. Chapter 2

Hello! I put in the summary that I was planning to leave this as a oneshot, but a large proportion of the wonderful people who reviewed the story wanted me to continue. So I'll try!

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**Chapter 2**

The silence stretched on, each passing second making it harder to break. _What happens now?_ Sam wondered, the thought echoing in his head as if it came from a distance, because a large part of his consciousness was still separate from the scene before him, wondering if it was real. The gunshot was still ringing in his ears. And still, there was nothing to say.

Distant sirens wailed, waking Sam from his reverie. Sam moved stiffly towards the paramedic who was pounding on his brother's chest, shocked that he had been so lethargic as Dean lay before him, all but dead. 'Let me help,' he offered, his voice sounding higher pitched than he intended. The man nodded gratefully, panting, from exertion or panic, Sam wasn't sure, and took Sam's hands, placing them carefully on the correct part of Dean's chest.

'Another ambulance is on its way. They send one out, whenever we take extra long to come back. And the police,' explained the man, his voice sounding like Sam felt, weary, and somehow vague, detached from reality. Sam could only nod, and continue his rhythmic compressions. David disappeared into the wrecked ambulance, clambering over twisted metal, the broken remains of the door, and smashed equipment. He returned with an oxygen mask, and placed it over Dean's face with shaking hands. Reality was slowly finding him.

'My God… Marie…it… I killed her. How…?'

Sam swallowed; glancing up into the man's anguished face. 'I can't explain it properly…' he offered, knowing it was an inadequate reply. The man had been possessed by a demon, and he needed to understand, at least, that it hadn't been _him_ who had crashed the ambulance and killed his partner. _And maybe killed Dean,_ Sam thought grimly, the idea bringing heat to his eyes which he fought away before it could produce tears. _It's too early for tears. _

'Please – what happened?'

'It's not easy… to explain. Or to believe. But there's… something… which wants to hurt my family. …It … was controlling you, using you to hurt us. It's not your fault, there wasn't anything you could do,' Sam choked out, hoping that it would do for an explanation, because he was hardly in the mood to tell a long, long story.

The man's face was a contorted mask of horror.

'I'm not crazy,' Sam sighed. 'I'm sorry that you have to hear this, but it _is_ true.'

'Am _I_ crazy?'

Sam considered this. 'Not yet,' he answered.

Dean suddenly drew in a choked breath, his hands twitching as he came round, and his eyes flickering, opening by a crack. Sam's grim mask shattered into a wide-eyed grin, and a tear slipped out onto his cheek. His relief was like a physical release; something broke open inside him, and all his clenched muscles could relax. He took in a deep breath of the night air, which was suddenly cool, fresh and invigorating. He scrubbed both hands through his hair, realising as he did that they were covered in Dean's blood.

'I never saw anyone looking so goofy,' Dean wheezed softly, frowning up at his brother. 'Even _you_'

Sam's voice was breathy, but it had lost its tight, high-pitched quality. 'My God, Dean, you scared me. Stop doing that.'

David watched Sam's reaction as his brother re-entered the land of the living, and he hoped that it wouldn't be temporary. The wailing sirens were now accompanied by flashing lights as the emergency services arrived in force, and David rose, walking up to the road, already trying to form an explanation for their situation, hating himself for seeking a lie to justify his partner's body. He clambered up the slope, passing John, who was sitting utterly still on the ground, staring blankly at the useless gun, which was clutched tightly in his hands.

'Sir…' David hesitated to address the man, he found him by far more disturbing than the two boys. 'I… suggest you hide the gun… I'll think of something to tell the authorities…' The sirens had stopped; assorted professionals in fluorescent yellow jackets were exiting their vehicles, talking excitedly.

John raised his heavy head to look at the paramedic, and a part of him was impressed at the man's rational assessment of the situation. But most of him was still too numb to register anything beyond the recent sirens, so he just nodded. David walked on. John looked down once more at the long, graceful barrel of the antique Colt. It was a beautiful gun, and in a previous life, he would have known how to appreciate it. But his eyes could see only a metal instrument for killing, and it could no longer serve the purpose for which it had been made. It was useless. He hurled it as hard as he could into the shrouded darkness between the trees.

David knew the young redheaded paramedic who leapt lightly down from the support ambulance. Her name was Louise; he liked her. For several months, he had debated whether he was too old to have a chance with her, but he had a retiring nature, so he had never found out.

'God, David, what happened?' she exclaimed, moving towards him and pressing gentle fingers against the bruises on his face. He winced, noticing for the first time that his face felt tender and swollen, and he was exhausted.

'I don't know… Marie must have lost control… it's not like her. God, Lou, she's dead.' The lies tasted sour and putrid on his tongue, especially the part that made Marie responsible for her own violent end.

His face crumpled, and Louise couldn't see past the grief to the guilt, so she took him in her arms and whispered in his ear, 'It's ok, it's not your fault, there was nothing you could have done…' Her sympathy broke him, and he sobbed unashamedly into her fluorescent shoulder.

After a moment, David gathered himself and pulled away from her. 'Down here... our patient was in a pretty bad way…' He began shuffling back down the incline, which was littered with fallen branches and treacherous in the dark. Louise and her partner collected the equipment they would need and followed him.

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Carrying a stretcher up the slope proved to be a challenge. Dean gritted his teeth, trying not to complain, because he knew they were making every effort not to jolt him, and wondered why he never passed out at the rare moments when it would be an advantage. Sam walked beside him, and was clearly making no such effort to avoid whining, as every time a paramedic stumbled or jerked the stretcher, he muttered 'Be careful!' and cast concerned glances at Dean. Dean wanted to tell him to stop it, but speaking seemed too much effort.

It took several minutes to reach the road, and the waiting ambulance. David, and Louise's partner, Geoff, were breathing hard when they set the stretcher down inside the vehicle, on another metal bed identical to the one in the previous ambulance. Dean shuddered, and smiled weakly in response to Sam's concerned look. 'Déjà vu…' he muttered. Sam glanced around.

'Would it be better if I ride with you?'

'No… you're not leaving my car unattended on the side of the road'

Sam opened his mouth to protest, but Dean's quiet, hoarse voice cut him off. 'It won't be back yet, Sammy. Soon,' he added, sighing in resignation, 'but not yet.'

Sam nodded.

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Several hours later, John found himself lying on his side in a curtained cubicle, his face screwed up against the pain as an elderly nurse cleaned and stitched the wound in his leg. The flattened bullet had been dug out of his thigh by a pale, tired looking doctor, who had offered to return it to him as a souvenir. John had almost felt sorry for the young man after he snapped his answer: 'Why the hell would I want a souvenir of getting shot?'. Almost. In fact, for a moment he had wondered whether the bullet could be re-used, but after seeing it, knew that he was clutching at straws. Any power it might once have held, it was gone now.

Grief swelled in his chest. _Mary, I'm sorry, I failed you again…_ The demon was still alive, and now he was worse than back to square one. He was out of inspiration, and eaten away by frustration. 22 years, and it had so nearly been over tonight. Twice. After a lifetime on the move, insecure, always fighting, he would welcome the peace, even if it could only come with death. _And I could see Mary again… _

He recalled the image of Sam's face, staring at him as if he was a monster as the gunshot echoed around them. John had been so sure that Sam understood his father's need for revenge, that he was driven by an identical zeal since Jessica had been murdered. He realised that it was his brother's influence which had changed Sam's perspective. _You fight and you fight for this family…_He could still taste the words, not his, but falling from his tongue. Dean had never known anything which could be put before family; he had never had anything stronger to motivate him. Like vengeance.

A part of John was aware that his quest for vengeance couldn't justify the sacrifice of his children. The same part knew that it would have torn him apart if he had killed his son for the sake of avenging his wife. It knew that Sammy was right to do all the things he had done that night. But the biggest part of him had been focused on revenge for too long to see anything else, and it fumed at Sam for preventing the resolution of such a long battle.

John was dragged from his reflections by the nurse's strict, nasal tones, informing him that his stitches were complete. 'The police will want to talk to you, sir. We have to inform them of any gunshot victims we treat.'

John just nodded, already fashioning a simple lie, because simple lies are far more effective than complex ones. The nurse waited for a few minutes, glaring into him over her wire-rimmed glasses with hard grey eyes. John looked a silent question at her.

'Your son is in the waiting room, sir. I can ask for news on the condition of your other son…?'

'Please'

She left, casting a last glance back at him, disapproval and pity combining oddly in her cold eyes.

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Sam rested his forehead against the cool glass of the window, closing his eyes to shut out the view through the slats of the blinds. Dean, unconscious, lying on a bed, surrounded by people who exchanged gabbled jargon at an alarming rate, and bleeping monitors.

Sam had left the waiting room; its clinical white walls, neatly arranged magazines and ancient coffee machine had been oppressive, he thought they would have driven him crazy if he had stayed there much longer. At that thought, he laughed inwardly. _All I've been through tonight, but finally beaten by a coffee machine. _He was standing in the corridor, staring into the treatment room, but he wasn't convinced that watching was any better than waiting.

'Sam?'

He turned quickly, startled.

'Sorry. You alright?' It was David, clutching a coffee cup, and looking a little more composed than the last time Sam had seen him, though still pale.

'Yeah,' Sam replied, shrugging. _Well, considering the circumstances…_

David nodded, smiling sadly. 'How's he doing?' he asked, motioning towards the window with his coffee cup.

'I don't know. The last update was a while ago, and not very conclusive… it doesn't _look _good.'

'It always looks like that. It might not be so bad as it seems,' David soothed. Sam looked at his earnest face, and wondered at the change from the expression wrought upon his features by the demon. 'Do you want some coffee?' he offered. 'That machine in the waiting room turns out hot water and dirt, come to the staff room,' he added, motioning for Sam to follow him through a green door marked 'Staff Only', without waiting for an answer.

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It was several more hours before the next news. Sam stood hesitantly when a doctor entered the staff room, wondering whether he had come to tell him about his brother, or to throw him out of the room.

'Mr Winchester?'

'Yes,' said Sam, wishing he'd had the presence of mind when they arrived to provide an alias, knowing his dad was going to kill him when the bill arrived. _Another reason to add to the list. _

'Your brother is stable,' the man told him. Sam exhaled slowly, blinking. 'He lost a lot of blood, so we gave him a transfusion, and we've sewn him up. He had some fairly extensive internal bleeding, but we took him to surgery, and we think we got it all. He's not necessarily out of the woods yet. But if there are no complications, he should be alright... I'd like to ask you about the nature of his injuries, they were... unique. The police wil have questions, too. But it can wait.'

Sam took a moment to digest this. _Thank God._ 'Can I see him?'

'He's sleeping. You can sit with him if you want to.'

'Thank you'

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That's it for now. I know nothing really happened, but at least I didn't make you wait long! And, hey, loads of things happened last chapter, so I'm just compensating. ;)


	3. Chapter 3

Well, here we go again! Thank you so much to everyone who's read/reviewed. Especially thank you Ani-maniac494 and Spooky Claire, your encouragement is much appreciated!

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**Chapter 3**

John's lies fell easily from his tongue, and he was too used to the sour taste they left to even notice it any more. He spun the story expertly, a simple explanation, with little touches of detail for authenticity: 'I think he had a tattoo on his arm… he had a strange accent, like he didn't speak English too well… he used an antique Colt revolver…'

The policeman nodded gratefully and left the cubicle with assurances that they would do their best, and a warning that he might need to be questioned again. John nodded.

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Sam was leaning against the wall in the corridor, waiting for the police to leave his father. He was dreading the talk, but he had reached a point of exhaustion where he was willing to do it now, get it over with so he could sleep. He had visited his brother, but Dean was still unconscious, and Sam had found it unnerving, sitting with him. He wasn't used to seeing his brother looking so torn and fragile, literally held together with a web of stitching and some staples.

Sam rubbed his face with his hands in an effort to keep his eyes open and realised that his palms were still stained dark brown with dried blood. He straightened up, intending to go clean himself up, aware that he must look dishevelled and alarming, but then he noticed the two blue uniforms disappearing up the corridor, and changed his mind. _Do this first…_

John was sitting up, pulling his jeans on carefully around his bandaged leg. He only glanced up when Sam entered, then returned to his task. The silence between them took on some weight, so that breaking it felt almost like a physical task. Sam frowned, and then took a deep breath, and began.

'So… I saw the doctor. Looks like Dean's going to be ok.' _So it's a good thing you didn't get to shoot him, huh?_ Only when John's head whipped round to fix him with a hard stare did Sam realise he had said the last sentence aloud.

'Sam, _think!' _John hissed. 'If I had made that shot, the demon would be gone. We'd have nothing to worry about… As it is, the demon is still out there. It knows where we are, it knows we haven't had a chance to regroup, and it _will_ be back. And we have nothing to fight with. Believe me, I'm glad your brother is alive, but for how long, Sam? We're completely defenceless. Next time it finds us, we're dead meat.'

Each word sunk slowly into Sam's mind, and he could almost understand. Almost.

'We could have avoided the whole thing if you'd just damn well shot me when I told you to,' John continued.

_How many fathers have said _that_ to their sons?_ Sam wondered.

'I really thought you could understand this… I need to get this thing; I can't just let it go. It's… all I live for.'

Sam chewed his lip, feeling tears swelling behind his eyes. 'Of course I want to get it. But you can't let revenge come before everything else, Dad… It's insane. Younearly convinced me… but, Dad, you almost _shot _your _son_!' He kept his voice to a harsh whisper, realising that the curtains provided only minimal privacy.

'Sam, I've been looking for revenge on this thing 22 years. Don't tell me I can't put it first!'

'You're putting it before Dean's life, now?'

'I already explained this, Sam,' John growled, his voice rising in volume.

'And I could almost understand… but no, you can't justify that.'

John grunted harshly, glaring at his son, and rose awkwardly to his feet. 'Right well…you two take care of yourselves,' he muttered, trying to move past Sam, who stepped sideways into his path.

'You're not… I don't believe you would leave again, now. Even you…' Sam could hardly keep the stunned disbelief out of his voice.

'We're all in danger, Sam, but it's worse if we're all in one place. I'll call you if I find anything… you should do some of your own research if you don't want to be sitting ducks when the damn thing comes back…'

'You can't just walk out of here…' Sam whispered fiercely, catching hold of his father's shirt, ignoring the strange looks he knew he was getting from passing nurses.

'I'm sorry, Sammy.'

And he was gone.

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Dean woke up slowly, his senses returning to him one by one. Hearing came first, and it was fairly disappointing. The regular _beep_ of some machine beside him, and in the distance, people bustling around quietly. Themuted hum of electrical equipment. Soft snoring.

Next, smell. Antiseptic. Worse than disappointing.

Then, taste. Dean's mouth felt dry and gritty, and he could still taste the residue of a remembered metallic flavour.

When the feeling returned to his body, he immediately wished it hadn't. His chest was generally aching, but it was peppered with small points of fiery agony. He sucked in air through his teeth, waiting for it to subside. When it didn't he just waited until he was more accustomed to it, and that didn't work much better. More to distract himself than anything else, he opened his eyes.

Sight, initially, seemed every bit as underachieving as the revelations of his other senses. A clinical white ceiling swayed into focus, and the upper part of a wall, which was painted an insipid shade of green. He lowered his eyes, and took in stiff white sheets, a small room, some beeping monitors, and Sam, sleeping in a chair beside the bed. _Explains the snoring, I was wondering about that. _

Dean smiled slightly at the way Sam was sleeping, slumped onto the bed, his mouth hanging open. _Looks like he needed it, too. _

Sam stirred, feeling his brother shift beside him. His eyebrows shot up. 'You're awake!'

'Wow, how did you know?'

Sam treated his brother to a withering look. Then he hesitated. 'Dean, I'm sorry… Dad left.'

To his surprise, Dean just nodded. 'Probably safest,' he muttered. 'Not sure I'm in the mood for spending time with the guy at the moment, anyway,' he admitted. Sam made an uncertain face, the one which always made Dean think of a puppy. He smirked. 'You look about 5 when you do that, Sammy.'

Sam scowled.

'So... they managed to put you together again'

'Yeah… you can mend anything if you got enough string.'

Sam snorted. 'Something like that.'

After a while, a nurse told Sam to go away; his brother needed rest. Sam left reluctantly, but Dean seemed happy – the nurse was in her late twenties, dark haired, petite and lively.

'I'll be back later,' Sam assured his brother on his way out.

'Sure, whatever. Get some sleep, you look… unattractive.' The nurse giggled, and Sam made a rude gesture at his brother.

'I will.'

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Sam had checked into a motel room with two beds out of habit, and after cleaning himself up, he slept for several hours. Later, he awoke and dug his laptop out of thetrunk of the Impala.

He sat down at the small table in the dingy little room, leaving the TV on in the background for company. It felt strange to be alone. He opened the laptop and sat facing it for a minute. Then he got up and made himself coffee, stalling. Then, out of excuses, he sat down again, and wondered where to start.

_Ceiling demon weakness._ 'Your search did not match any documents.' _Typical._

_Ceiling demon. _'Your search did not match any documents.' Sam wasn't particularly surprised.

_Demon. _'Results 1 - 10 of about 8,490,000 for _demon_.**' **

_Right… now what? _Something told him that the Internet wasn't going to be particularly helpful in this research. He pushed the computer away, and rested his head in his hands. _Think, Sam!_

After ten minutes, he gave up and went to see Dean.

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Dean was awake, flirting with the nurse, who kept finding things she needed to fiddle with or clean in his room. Sam regarded his brother through the blinds before entering. He was still pale, and there was a veiled look in his eyes which had not been there before their encounter with the demon. But he was grinning, chatting animatedly with the sparky brunette. Sam was always amazed at his brother's ability to put on a mask which said he was fine, but this was exceptional. He wondered whether it was healthy for him to be constantly hiding his emotions, but he knew better than to attempt curing Dean of that particular habit.

'Hey, it's me' Sam declared, opening the door and stepping into the room.

'Hey,' Dean greeted him. 'You look better. I didn't want to tell you yesterday, but you looked like a crazy person.'

'Thanks'

'Now you just look like… a mop.'

The nurse giggled again, but then she caught sight of the stern-looking matron passing the open door. 'I better go… I have to…' she made a vague hand gesture, grimacing at Dean.

'Yeah, sure. Come back,' he replied. She grinned at him and left.

'How do you do it?' Sam said, trying not to sound jealous. Dean smirked at him, and he knew he'd failed.

'So, what happens now?' asked Dean.

Sam looked at him, detecting the change in his tone. Suddenly serious. 'I'm not sure. I was trying to do some research, but I don't know where to start.'

Dean nodded sympathetically. 'Ok, so start with… what do we know?'

'It can possess people, but it can also take corporeal form. It's nasty. It kills women when their babies are 6 months old. It claimed to have... _children_…'

Dean listened to Sam's summary, searching for a clue they might have missed, something that could be deduced from one of the facts his little brother was counting off.

'…and… it's resistant to holy water. That's all I can think of.' He shrugged in defeat. 'Doesn't give us much to go on.'

Dean was silent, re-running the list through his head. 'What kind of demon is resistant to holy water?' he muttered.

Sam considered, wondering why Dean had picked up on that detail in particular, but willing to go with it, for lack of a better idea. 'Well, it's a kind of superstition thing, for most demons. Except that, when it comes to demons, superstitions tend to manifest themselves physically. Demons are associated with the devil, so anything associated with Christianity is like... reallybad luck to them, in the same way that a normal person might think anything demonic was bad luck.'

'I've warned you before about the dangers of swallowing textbooks, Sammy.'

Sam rolled his eyes. 'So, if this demon is resistant to holy water… it's… not like a normal demon,' he concluded weakly.

Dean frowned. 'What if it was a really old demon? Like, _really _old… pre-Christian. Would it still have the same effect?'

Sam considered. 'No, probably not. I mean, then, at the time of it's… creation, Christian blessings wouldn't have been associated with divinity. The Catholic mass would just have been… words.'

'So we'd be looking at pagan gods?' Dean asked, raising an eyebrow.

'I guess. I mean… we're just guessing…'

'But we don't have anything better to go on'

'I'll check it out'

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That's it, for the moment. I hope it's not getting boring. I promise, things will happen in later chapters! But I left so many loose ends hanging in the first chapter, I needed to tidy up a bit. Please review, even if you can't think of anything in particular to say, I'll be thrilled to hear it! I can probably get another chapter up before I go on holiday, then there'll be a pause. Looking forward to reading the review that you _know_ you want to write ;) Until next time!


	4. Chapter 4

Hello again! Thank you so much to everyone who reviewed, particularly Spooky Claire and Ani-Maniac494, who are still my favourite people:) I wasn't sure about that last chapter, so your support was very welcome.

Oh, and I just realised I'm supposed to do this, so: I don't own Supernatural, any of its characters etc. And I didn't when I wrote the other chapters, either.

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After Sam left, Dean slumped back into his pillows, exhausted, rubbing a hand against his face. He ached all over, and his chest felt unpleasantly raw, as though it were still open for the entire world to see, not to mention full of stitches. Even with the pretty nurse's frequent visits, Dean thought the unchanging view of green walls and white ceiling would drive him insane if he had to look at it much longer. He closed his eyes to avoid it, and it was replaced swiftly by his father's face, contorted with hatred, eyes glowing yellow. His eyes flew open again, and he swallowed hard, pressing his palms against his eyelids.

Dean turned his head sideways, watching an unlucky night-shift nurse wandering past his room like a sleepwalker in the dimly lit corridor. There was little activity in the hospital at this time of night. He knew that he should be sleeping, that he needed to sleep in order to heal, but he was reluctant to make himself vulnerable to more unwanted dreams.

Reaching onto the small table beside his bed, he searched for reading material, and found a long outdated car magazine left behind by the room's previous inmate. It was dull, the kind of magazine which suggests practical family cars rather than describing anything exciting or interesting. Dean opened it, but he reached the bottom of a page without absorbing the subject of the article. He scanned back, wondering if he'd missed anything interesting, straining his eyes to read by the dim light filtering in through the blinds. After several minutes, he gave up, and slumped back down in the bed, wondering whether he could risk sleep. His eyelids were heavy.

The light from the corridor flickered, making the shadows on the bed move as if alive, and Dean was fully awake in an instant, looking around frantically. But now the light was back to normal. He frowned, reproaching himself for being so jumpy. _Those damn fluorescent tubes flicker all the time. _Nevertheless, he checked that his cell phone was easily within reach on the table before wriggling back down into the bed, wincing as the movement aggravated his fragile chest.

The light flickered again, and he jerked, startled. Then, for several seconds, he lay still, trying to will his heart rate to return to normal. _All the time…there's no need to assume that it's…_

A shadow moved, up in the corner of the room. Dean's head swung round abruptly, but there was nothing there. He exhaled slowly. _Pull yourself together, Dean…_

For several minutes, he lay tensed and unmoving, his eyes wide-open, watching the room for any further signs. Nothing. He swallowed. Then took a deep breath, told himself sternly to stop behaving like a girl, and decided to risk sleeping.

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While his brother struggled to sleep, Sam was struggling _not_ to sleep. Once again stationed in front of the laptop in the dingy motel room, Sam was gazing distractedly at a page of pagan blessings, his eyelids creeping downwards only to be forced open again. He groaned, blinked, and tried to focus.

A few minutes later, Sam was slumped forward over his keyboard, typing a long line of random letters into the search engine with his sleeping head.

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Dean was asleep in his hard hospital bed, breathing evenly but not without effort. His face, lit by the split light filtering through the blinds, looked pensive, rather than peaceful: he was frowning slightly, as if he were dreaming.

Hisexpression seemed tochange suddenly, but it was just the effect caused by the light moving. Flickering, in fact. It continued to flicker, past the point where a normal fluorescent tube would have sputtered out.

In the doorway, the shadows started moving as well as the light, pulling together into one dense shadow, such thick darkness that it was almost tangible, like smoke. The smoke gathered even closer together, and formed into a shape – a figure – dark, hunched, and bizarrely solid for a man who, until recently, had been only a shadowy mist. Out of its eye sockets burned a sickly, yellow light.

The figure moved forward to stand over Dean, watching him intently. Dean stirred, his frown deepening, then opened his eyes a crack. Then he opened them all the way, drawing back in shock. And the figure laughed.

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Sam jerked awake with a strangled yelp, springing to his feet. He took a moment to take in the implications of what he had just seen. His panicked gaze fell on the computer screen, which was still showing a variety of ancient pagan blessings and rituals.

And within five minutes, he was driving like a maniac, on his way to the hospital.

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Somewhere in the back of his head, Dean knew he was dreaming. That he could open his eyes, and see the hideously coloured walls of his hospital room. That this had already happened, and fear was irrational, and the pain he felt was only remembered pain, so it shouldn't really hurt like this.

But his sleeping mind didn't listen to logic, so it hurt like hell, just as it had the last time.

'Dad, please…' he heard himself plead, before another spasm wracked his bleeding body and he slumped forward.

The part of him that knew he was dreaming knew also what ought to happen next, so it was surprised when, instead of fading back to their familiar dark brown, his father's eyes glowed a stronger yellow, and instead of whispering 'Stop it,' the face before him laughed.

It was that same part of his mind which warned Dean that it was time to wake up, and fast.

Dean had learnt reliable instincts from twenty-two years of dangerous living, and a feeling of wrongness filled him before he had even tried to open his eyes. As soon as he did, he was met with a view full of darkness, glowing at the centre with two point of yellow light. _Oh, shit… _

Automatically, he curled into himself protectively, drawing away from the creature as far as he could, but realising quickly that, once again, he was helpless before it, with nowhere to run, and no guarantee that he _could _run even if there were. The demon saw fear shining in his eyes and laughed softly, echoing the sound he had dreamed.

'This looks familiar,' smiled the thing, speaking hoarsely through lips which were a corpse-like shade of grey.

Dean shifted sideways, willing to fall out of bed if it would put some distance between him and this… thing. Its cold hand grasped him by the shoulder, and he shuddered at its clammy touch, trying futilely to pull away.

'Stop trying to escape: it's so pathetic, it's embarrassing,' hissed the demon into his ear, much too close to him, so that Dean could smell the stench of death on its breath.

'Why…' Dean asked it vaguely, stalling, his eyes searching for a panic button.

It laughed again, humourlessly. 'Because it's fun. Because you killed my children…' It leaned even closer, and Dean shrank away. 'And because we both know Sammy will be mine within a week without his big brother to keep him grounded.'

Dean growled wordlessly, and lashed out with a fist, anger adding strength which he shouldn't have had, considering the number of stitches holding his chest together. Not enough, though: the creature caught his arm easily in an icy hand.

Something constricted around Dean's throat, although the demon still appeared to be standing over him, unmoving. He gasped weakly, his windpipe burning, and his chest exploding with agony as it contracted desperately for air. Beside him, a monitor began beeping frantically, but Dean hardly noticed, lost in pain, black spots dancing in his vision. The night-shift nurse appeared in the doorway, looking horrified.

'Sir, what are you…?'

An invisible force pushed her away, and she staggered back, then stood swaying for several seconds and promptly fainted.

_Oh, fantastic,_ Dean thought.

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Sam didn't even stop to slam the car door when he arrived at the hospital. He ignored a shout telling him that he couldn't park there and sprinted into the reception area. A sleepy secretary told him that visiting hours were long over, and called after him angrily when he ran past her without word. Along the corridor, he heard a nurse's startled voice, cut off abruptly, and he rounded the corner in time to see her collapse.

Dean was choking, his eyes half closed, hands clawing at some invisible assailant at his throat. And the demon stood over him, smiling cruelly.

'Hey!'

It turned, lips curving into another grin. 'Hello, Sammy'

'Get away from him,' Sam ordered, advancing into the room, trying hard not to tremble violently enough for it to notice.

'Or what?' it asked sweetly. Dean made a wheezing sound; hisgasps were getting feebler by the second.

Sam produced a small bottle from under his jacket and unscrewed the lid swiftly.

'What makes you think that will work any better than it did last time?' sneered the demon.

Sam said nothing, but curled his lip in a grimace and stepped forward, splashing water over the creature's face.

An unpleasant blistering sound filled the air, and the demon hissed in rage. Dean stopped struggling, and gasped in a mouthful of air.

The demon stepped towards Sam with murder in its eyes, but he threw the last of the blessed water over it, and it stopped, twisting its mouth in fury, and dissolved into it's black smoke. Gone. For now.

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I'm very sorry, my chapters keep getting shorter. But, at least something happened in this one! Please review, say what you like, but say _something! _


	5. Chapter 5

Hello! I still don't own Supernatural. And here's Chapter 5:

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**Chapter 5**

'You ok?' Sam asked breathlessly. He was making the puppy face again. Dean thought of a number of sarcastic replies, but to his disappointment, he found that his throat was still too raw to voice them, so he settled for a raised eyebrow. Sam seemed to get the point. 'Well, you know… considering the circumstances.'

Dean nodded, coughing, clutching his aching chest. Sam winced, walking over to him. 'You're not having a good week, man…' he said softly, rubbing his brother's back as the coughing fit continued.

'Christ, you're observant today Sam,' Dean rasped, rubbing his throat. His eyes turned serious. 'Is it gone?'

Sam wondered why Dean was asking him: neither of them could see it. But, he realised, he could _feel_ that it was gone; the air was free of a polluting presence which had been there until a few moments ago. 'It's gone,' he asserted.

Dean nodded. Accepting.

Out in the corridor, the middle aged nurse stirred. 'Go see if she's ok,' Dean instructed his brother, and Sam went obediently. She was sitting up on the polished grey floor, adjusting her hair agitatedly and trembling.

'Ma'am? Are you ok?' Sam asked politely.

'I… don't know what came over me…'

Sam marvelled at the human mind's capacity to forget what it knew it shouldn't have seen, but on this occasion he was grateful for it. He wasn't in the mood to make the 'the truth is out there' speech again. He helped her to her feet with his best chivalrous smile, and she stood, swaying a little, trying to blink away her confused memories.

'The alarm was going!' she recalled urgently, elbowing past Sam into Dean's room. 'Are you alright, Mr Winchester?'

'Yeah,' Dean muttered, still rubbing his throat absently, slumping back into his pillows with a wince.

'I heard your heart monitor… it seems to have settled down now,' she continued.

Dean nodded impatiently, waiting for her to go away.

'Well, give me a call if you need anything.'

'Yeah.' Dean scowled at her back as she walked unsteadily out of the room. As soon as the door swung shut behind her, he turned enquiring eyes to Sam. 'So, how'd you do it?' he asked, trying not to sound impressed.

'The water?'

'Yeah, Sam, the water. It sure as hell didn't work like that last time.'

'Well… you remember we talked about maybe the demon pre-dates Christianity?'

Dean nodded, eyebrows raised. _Yes, and…?_

'So, I looked up some pagan blessings on the Internet. Blessings that pre-Christian cultures used to make things sacred. And I blessed the water.'

Dean looked impressed now, in spite of himself. 'Top marks, Sammy. And, just for the record… you turned up here in the middle of the night… just to tell me that? Not that I'm ungrateful, but…'

'I had a vision,' Sam mumbled.

'Ah.' Dean nodded again. _Oh, a vision. Right. Of course._

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Several days later, it occurred to Sam that their father would want to be informed of their breakthrough with the holy water. It wasn't a solution to their problem, but it was a step in the right direction, and Sam was eager to give John some good news, as part of him was still trying to compensate for his guilt over the Colt's wasted final bullet. Standing in the hospital parking lot, perched on the Impala's dusty hood, he flicked through his contacts until he reached his father's number. _Bet you anything I get voicemail…_he thought to himself.

_'This is John Winchester…' _Sam scowled, listening impatiently to the too-familiar message, waiting for the tone.

'Hi, Dad. It's Sam. I hope you're ok… Dean's doing well; he can probably be discharged in the next few days. But, uh… we saw the demon again. Dad, it's vulnerable to pagan symbols; the holy water didn't work 'cause it's older than the Catholic Mass… so, give us a call some time, ok? Um… Bye.'

Sam flicked the phone shut, sighing. He remained sitting on the car for a while, thinking, until a voice broke into his meditations.

'Hey, Sam!'

It was David, walking towards him across the parking lot, dressed in his paramedic uniform, clearly back at work. Sam admired his quick recovery fromhis ordeal, and from his friend's death.

'Hey. How're you doing?'

'I'm ok,' the paramedic replied, with a slight frown. 'It helps me focus, if I'm working… sitting at home thinking about things just… doesn't help. And you? What about your brother, I heard he was recovering pretty well.' Guilt flashed briefly in his eyes – he still felt partially responsible for what the demon had used his body to do.

'Yeah, we're good.' Sam replied. 'Doctor's reckon they'll let Dean go soon. He's pleased… he'd be climbing the walls in there, except he's got a few nurses to keep him company.'

David grinned. 'I'm glad he's feeling better.'

Sam nodded, looking down at his feet, searching for words.

'Listen, David… if you wanted to ask me anything… about what happened, I know it must be hard to… digest… I'll try to help.'

David chewed his lip. 'Thanks. I don't think I'm ready to… talk about it… yet,' he admitted haltingly, studying the ground. 'But… thanks.'

Sam nodded again. 'Well… I should get back in there…' he gestured vaguely in the direction of the hospital.

'Yeah.'

'So, take care of yourself.'

'Thanks. I will… and you… just… make sure you get that thing, ok?'

Sam looked up, startled, suddenly recognising the grief shining in the other man's eyes. He frowned pensively. 'Yeah. Yes, we will,' he promised.

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Dean's doctors were conflicted about the idea of letting him out of hospital. In theory, he should be able to manage, if he was given a substantial supply of painkillers, and there was no reason to suppose that his condition would worsen again. On the other hand, he was still suffering, still fragile, and most people would have been kept in longer as a precaution. In this particular case, however, there were non-medical factors which had an impact on the decision. First, Dean was desperate to escape from the dull little room; he hated being waited on in hospital and as a result he was increasingly grouchy with his doctors. And second, the doctor in charge of his case was young and male, and had had his eye on the young nurse Lucy for quite some time before the arrival of the Winchesters. Oh, yes, there were many reasons why he would be glad to discharge Dean.

Dean himself was thrilled to be leaving, although he would miss Lucy, and he had stored her number in his cell 'just in case'. He was unimpressed by the 'hospital policy' which demanded that he was wheeled off the premises in a chair, and insisted on Lucy as the chair pusher rather than Sam.

When they reached the parking lot, Dean tilted back his head to enjoy the sensation of breathing air free from the scent of disinfectant for the first time in almost a week. He was appreciating his ability to breathe much more than he used to. It still made his chest ache when he inhaled too deeply, but the ease with which he could pull air into his lungs was strangely liberating after his recent experiences.

Lucy bid him a flirtatious farewell when they reached Impala: 'Wow, is that your car?' He grinned, nodding. 'It's amazing… You'd better call me, Dean Winchester!'

'Yeah, I will,' he promised vaguely. _Well, I might._

Sam raised an eyebrow at him, and he shrugged in reply. Lowering himself carefully into his beloved car, he reluctantly acknowledged that Sam would have to drive.

Sam watched his careful movements with concerned eyes. 'You sure you're well enough to be out of -,'

'Yes, absolutely positive.'

Sam frowned. 'Alright,' he conceded grudgingly.

Dean wriggled down into a more comfortable position, leaning against the car's leather upholstery, relishing his freedom. The drive back to the motel Sam had been staying in was short and uninteresting, but Dean enjoyed it all the same.

Sam parked as close as he could possibly get to the door of their room, then hovered uncertainly as Dean climbed slowly out of the car, wincing as the muscles in his chest moved, then frowning at his little brother. 'I'm good, Sam,' he told his brother, fixing him with a wide eyed stare.

Sam nodded distractedly, hurrying to open the door for Dean, who rolled his eyes. 'How 'bout you go get my bag out the trunk or something, Sam… just stop rushing round me like a mother hen.'

'Yeah, sorry…'

'Don't apologise!'

'Sorr-,' he grinned. 'OK, I'll stop.'

'Good.' Dean smirked, amused by his brother's earnest expression, before turning away into the motel room.

He took a long hot shower, feeling only mild guilt for using all the hot water. The sensation of the hot water against his back was soothing, and it helped to relieve some of the tension in his still-aching chest. He grimaced at his reflection in the steamy mirror, his pale chest still riddled with stitches. _I look like Frankenstein's monster…_

Sam knocked on the door. 'Dean, you haven't drowned in there or anything, have you?' Dean didn't miss the concern in his voice.

'Hmm? No, haven't drowned,' he replied absent-mindedly.

After another few minutes, he emerged fully dressed from the bathroom, unwilling to parade his scarred chest in front of Sam. _God knows, he's fussing enough already…_

'Did you use all the hot water?'

'Yup,' he answered brightly, flopping down onto a bed.

Sam growled at him in mock fury. Dean closed his eyes, lying flat on his back on the bed. 'Whatever, dude…' he muttered. He fell asleep to the sound of Sam's gasps under the icy jet of water.

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Sam struggled, even though he knew it was pointless against the invisible grip which held him against the wall. John was standing in front of Dean, and Sam, his head still ringing from the battering it had taken in the alleyway, could only just make out what they were saying. He wriggled again, but nothing had changed, he still couldn't move.

'I bet you're real proud of your kids too, huh?' Dean was whispering. 'But… oh, I forgot… I wasted 'em.'

_Great idea Dean... Piss off the homicidal maniac wearing our father's face…_

The demon was silent, and Sam tensed in anticipation of what was coming. Dean's cry cut through him, and his futile struggles redoubled. He called out to his brother repeatedly, but his only answers were Dean's anguished gasps. It was thirty seconds of Sam's life which would remain etched onto his memory for a lifetime.

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Sam jerked awake, finding the sheets twisted around his feet; clearly he had been struggling in his sleep. The dream was familiar by now. He looked around the dark motel room, his eyes resting on Dean, sleeping in the next bed. He was twitching slightly, a half-frown creasing his forehead.

'Dean,' Sam hissed, reaching over to put a hand on his arm. Dean awoke with a gasp.

'Huh! Oh… Jesus, Sammy, don't do that…' he mumbled sleepily.

'You were dreaming'

'I know'

'Want to tell me what it was about?'

_No…_ 'That hot nurse, Lucy,' he lied. It sounded less convincing than his usual stories, and he wondered whether he was losing his talent for spinning tales.

'Really? 'Cause I was dreaming about that night in the cabin…'

Dean scowled at his brother. 'Yeah, alright… Might have been that.'

Sam considered asking Dean if he wanted to talk about it, but quickly concluded that there was no point. He already knew what his brother's answer would be, and anyway, they needed to put that disaster behind them, as far as possible, and move on. They had work to do.

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Please review! I'll be your friend forever!

I'm going away next week. I might get another chapter up before I go, but if not, I'll be aiming to write the rest of the story while I'm away, so I can type it into the computer and put it up fairly quickly when I get back. So, there'll be a pause, but don't worry, the ending is coming!


	6. Chapter 6

This story is now completed – I wrote it on holiday, so it's scrawled over a lot of file paper in my atrocious handwriting, and it should be up as quickly as I can type it in. I really need a secretary! Anyway… I'm pleased with it, overall, though there are some parts that I don't like. Please tell me what you think. And, btw – my next fic will be _much_ less ambitious!

**Chapter 6**

Two weeks after he was released from the hospital, Dean was beginning to feel like a normal person again. He picked out his own stitches, earlier than he should have done, but he could no longer bear the sight of his chest held together with black wire. Now, the vivid scars were still striking, but they would soon start to fade, though it was unlikely that they would ever disappear. The sight of them in the mirror twisted Dean's stomach, because they showed his injuries for the world to see, and because they stirred ever-present memories which he preferred to repress.

After the breakthrough with the pagan holy water, the demon had disappeared, and the brothers' obsessive research had thrown up nothing but a frustrating succession of false trails and empty leads. As well as seeking its weakness, Sam had started scouring the Internet for news of the temperature fluctuations and electrical storms which indicated the creature's presence, but this, too, had yielded no results. He had called his father a few times, wondering if he was doing any better, but every attempt had ended with him hanging up angrily as soon as the voicemail message started up. Sam's temper was getting shorter by the day.

At the moment, he was lying stretched out on his stomach on a bed, staring at the computer screen with glazed eyes. Dean was sitting at the small table, scanning a dull local newspaper, his chin resting in one hand, elbow propped up on the table.

Sam tapped his fingers irritably against the laptop.

'You found anything?'

'No,' Dean replied without looking up. _Just like I hadn't five minutes ago, Sam…_

'I don't know where else we can look,' Sam muttered, a tight edge easily discernible in his voice.

Dean had to agree. They had tried the library, the college, a series of dry, complicated books and old records, and every paranormal website Sam could pull up. They were quickly running out of options. Still giving up wouldn't help, and, knowing that the demon wasn't finished with their family, they couldn't just stop looking.

'We'll find it, Sam… we always find it in the end,' Dean said, in a voice quieter and softer then his usual one. The change of tone caused Sam to look up, and their eyes met. The frustration drained slowly from the younger brother's face, and he nodded, something like determination glowing in his eyes.

Dean got slowly to his feet – he could manage it with barely a wince, now – and perched next to Sam on the edge of the narrow bed. The computer screen showed a page of ancient pagan blessings, some in languages Dean could recognise, others in symbols so old that, had he come across them anywhere else, he wouldn't have realised that they were writing at all.

'What are these?' he asked, waving a long-fingered hand vaguely in the direction of the computer screen.

'Different pagan blessings… those ones are runes, they're ancient Scandinavian letters.'

Dean made a face. The harsh, angular shapes looked crude and senseless; it was had to believe that they had ever been a form of communication. 'They look like something scratched on a wall by a drunk graffiti artist with a long stick,' he observed.

He scanned the rest of the page, recognising some symbols as Greek alphabet, and then, at the bottom, the familiar Roman letters, little different from the characters still used today throughout the Western world.

'Are they Latin, at the bottom?'

'Yeah, they're the ones I used, before. I didn't know how to pronounce any of the others.'

'Lucky those ones worked, then'

'Yeah… maybe anything old enough would work, I don't know. Or maybe I was just lucky.'

'Well… so we know the Latin ones work, we go with that,' Dean suggested, shrugging his shoulders.

'Yeah I guess. So… these verses are supposed to instil the blessing of…' He traced his finger along the line of text. 'Pluto'

Dean smirked, and Sam rolled his eyes at his brother.

'Dean, your whole childhood, you were researching demons instead of watching cartoons, and yet when someone says "Pluto", you _still_ think of Disney?'

Dean smacked his brother's floppy head half-heartedly, leaning forward to scan the rest of the Latin phrases. A few familiar words stood out… 'demon', 'protect', 'expel'…

'So, Pluto… what does he do?' he asked. Sam was serious again in an instant.

'He rules hell, basically.'

'Doesn't really sound like one of the good guys…'

'Well, he…. controls the gates of hell. Makes sure no one enters who shouldn't. And makes sure the demons can't leave. Controls them. So, traditionally, he's more feared by demons than most pagan gods.'

Dean sounded impressed. 'Ok… good choice, then.'

Sam smiled – it was rare to receive praise instead of mockery when he demonstrated his extensive knowledge, and he was barely conscious of how much he wanted his older brother's praise.

'So… we can assume this demon dates from…. when? Several hundred years before Christ?' Dean continued, trying to dredge up long forgotten high school history.

'Yeah, or more than that,' Sam replied.

Dean nodded absently, frowning.

'So, I've been looking for ways of killing demons from that time,' Sam added, 'but I'm drawing a blank. There aren't many accounts, and when there are, the demon's often described as immortal.'

Dean winced, but then shook his head firmly. 'Nah, nothing's immortal. We know it's vulnerable to some things, we just need to work out how to use it…'

'Yeah. And that's the problem.'

There was a silence.

'So… this Pluto guy… his blessing can hurt the demon, but you can't… kinda…. magnify it? So that it kills?'

'Don't think so,' Sam answered flatly, rolling over onto his back, away from his brother and the computer. He had never spent so many hours studying even at college, and his eyes felt grainy, yearning for sleep.

Dean pulled the computer towards him, and he stretched his fingers uncertainly over the keyboard. He could use a computer, but he didn't understand how it worked enough to avoid frequent error messages and freezing the screen, so he was less confident than Sam when it came to searching the Internet. Still, he knew Sam could do with the sleep, so he was willing to give it a try.

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Sam had had this dream so many times now that he had come to expect it every time he went to sleep. However, the intensity of the dream had not been diluted by its endless repetition. Sam was pinned and helpless, trying to move the useless gun on the floor by concentrating so hard it made his head ache. Pinned, forced to watch his brother bleed. Struggling against the bonds he couldn't see, trying to focus when all his mind could do was scream 'Dean!' Trying to think of a way out when the last person he still cared for was dying before his eyes. He felt as though something was pulling him apart inside, and all he could do was stand and let it happen.

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The computer screen went white, and loaded the page at an agonizingly slow rate, while Dean sat twiddling his thumbs, almost nervously. Finally, text and pictures flickered up across the page. Dean read it carefully. Then he blinked. Then he read it again. Then he stretched out a hand, and gently shook his brother's shoulder.

'Sam'

Sam jerked awake with a muffled cry, and glanced around the room, blinking, rubbing his temples.

'Dreaming?'

'Yeah'

'Look at this'

Sam pressed his fingers against his eyelids and sat up. The dream was exhausting; he felt more tired now than he had when he had gone to sleep, only a few hours earlier.

The website lacked any flashy graphics or stylish design; it was simply a page of cramped black text on a white background. The bottom of the page was illustrated with an amateurish pencil sketch of a malicious, grinning face, eyes coloured in with yellow highlighter.

'That's…'

'Yeah'

'Does it…?' Sam scanned the text, and let out a slow breath, suddenly wide awake. 'How the hell did you find this? I've been looking for two weeks!'

Dean's only response was a wide grin, the first Sam had seen since that night in the cabin.

'So now… we just need to find it,' Sam muttered, smiling. Dean scowled at him.

'Hey, I've done my part. Any further research is your job.'

Sam attempted a mock scowl, but the effect was spoiled by the corners of his mouth turning up of their own accord into a goofy grin. 'Yeah, I guess,' he conceded. He was secretly amazed that Dean had managed to work the thing at all – usually the laptop froze as soon as he touched it. But, he decided, this wasn't the time to say so.

The page described a yellow eyed demon of unknown origin, which used to prowl the world in search of children with paranormal powers, and then baptise them into its care with a cruel ritual –the burning of the one they most loved over their heads, the night they turned six months old. Sam leaned forward to read it more thoroughly, and his eyes grew wider and wider as they moved down the page.

According to the researcher who had written the page, two such demons had been created, but one was no longer in existence. Somehow, it had been killed.

Miraculously, the page went on to give an account of the creature's death. The style was archaic and halting, somehow awkward and unnatural, but at least it was clear:

'This creature was impure and dark, so it could be overcome by light and purity. Thus, it could be best fought with weapons fashioned from purest gold. The creature was powerful, but was killed by weapons consecrated with the blessing of the ancient Lord of the Underworld, for he lowered its defences. When the demon adopted a disguise, its true nature was visible only in the eyes. The eyes, then, were its life source, and from such a wound in that place, it could not recover.'

Sam blinked, hard. 'Wow. Somebody up there likes us. I don't believe we were this lucky… Gold bullets. That's a new one.'

Dean grinned again. 'Could be expensive, though,' he commented, gesturing towards the final paragraph on the screen.

'Well… I guess it depends on how many bullets you need.'

Dean was all set to make a cocky reply, but then he remembered the Colt.

'Maybe three or four. Just to be safe.'

'Yeah?'

'Yeah.'

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Later, Dean lay awake, listening to the soft snores of his brother, who was sleeping peacefully for once, and he worried. When John had called, he had slipped out of the motel room to avoid waking Sam. His father's voice had been distant and crackling, difficult to hear, but he had thought he detected an edge of panic in it which he had never heard there before.

'_Dean? I don't have long, so just listen, alright?'_

'_Dad? Where are you? Sam's been trying to call you.'_

'_Just listen, Dean! Take down this website…it can help you.'_

'_Website? What the hell? Dad, just tell me where you are -,'_

'_I can't. Don't look for me. Write this down…' He reeled off the site address, and Dean scrawled it across the corner of the newspaper, which he was still holding._

'_Ok, I got it. Now, please, at least tell me what you're doing. Are you ok?'_

'_I have to go...' He cleared his throat awkwardly, almost as if embarrassed. Or maybe it was just static on the line. 'Take care of yourself Dean. And take care of Sam.' The line went dead, and Dean felt himself freeze. John hadn't said it, but it had been there in his voice. Goodbye. _

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There are parts of this chapter that I really don't like. I'd love to hear you opinions. More soon. I'm expecting it to be about 9 chapters in total, just to give you an idea.

Reviews, please!


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

Staring up at the grimy ceiling, Dean wondered whether he was doing the right thing, keeping secrets from Sam. He was uncomfortable taking credit for the research, so he had avoided answering Sam's questions. He hated lying to Sam. He could lie to everyone else, even to his father, to some extent, but not to Sam. So he put on a grinning mask, and said nothing.

He was worried by his father's uncharacteristic recklessness, giving him the website over the phone. Surely, with information like that, he would instruct them to meet up with him so that they could end it together, as a family. It was also unlike him to just give them the information – _almost as if he wanted us to finish it without him, _Dean reflected, a chill running down his spine.

Suddenly it occurred to him that the last time his father had behaved so out of character, he had been possessed by a demon. For several moments he lay paralysed as the implications of the idea flashed through his mind. The website was a fake, John was in its power again, it would find them easily.

But the site was too old to have been set up simply to trap the Winchesters, Dean considered, and anyway, the solution didn't _appear_ genuine enough to be a trap. And when he thought about it, his father hadn't seemed a different man on the phone. He was the same as he had always been, but in a mode of panic more severe than Dean had ever known him.

And this led to his other fear, of course. What could have caused such panic? Unless… unless the demon had found John, and he knew it was coming for him. He would have tried to pass on what he had found out so that his boys could take the thing out when he was gone. It seemed horribly likely. Dean wanted more than anything to convince himself that this theory was implausible, unlikely. But he had heard the fear in John's voice. And the finality. _'Take care of yourself, Dean. And take care of Sam.' Goodbye._

The sensible part of Dean's mind, the part which knew denial was not an option, knew too that the whole thing would be easier to deal with if he told Sam. But, before everything else, he was programmed to protect Sam, and it had seemed so cruel to spoil his little brother's moment of triumph by telling him '…and the _bad _news is, our father's probably dead.'

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For the first time in weeks, Sam slept deeply and mercifully dreamlessly, and he woke up to morning sunlight filtering in hazy stripes through the blinds, instead of the half-hearted birdsong and distant arguments that he usually woke up to in the small hours of the morning. He felt refreshed, full of optimism, somehow living in a blissful lull between the frustration of the unsuccessful research and the looming terror of the fight to come.

Dean was nowhere to be seen, but an untidy scribbled note on the table seemed to include something like the word 'breakfast'.

By the time he had showered, singing loudly and completely out of tune, Dean had returned with some coffee, looking pale and tired.

'You ok?' Sam asked him.

'Yeah… couldn't sleep,' he mumbled, pulling a newspaper out of his jacket. 'There was an electrical storm in a town in Georgia.'

'Really?' Sam snatched the newspaper and flicked through it, rustling the pages loudly in his hurry.

'Well… it doesn't necessarily mean anything,' Dean pointed out.

'It's worth looking,' Sam replied, typing the name of the town into his laptop. It was the latest in a series of towns. They would hear of unusual weather somewhere and investigate the area's climate over the last couple of weeks. Usually, it had just been a one-off occurrence. Once or twice, they had noticed a pattern of temperature fluctuations, but never one conclusive enough to suggest the demon's presence. One area was plagued with electrical storms, but it had been for several years – clearly there was a problem with the area, possibly even a supernatural one – but not _the_ demon.

The Georgian town in question was small and insignificant, and its weather report showed the expected warm climate. However, browsing through old reports, Sam pulled up a previous storm a few days before, and another a week ago, along with a comment from a resident saying that he had never known so many electrical storms in one month, and he had lived there his whole life. Looking back at the recent reports in more detail, Sam noticed that, although the temperature was averaging a not-unusual 75°, they had recorded drops as far down as 50°, and a peak of 88°. Sam looked up, wide eyed.

'Dean, I think this one might be worth checking out.'

'Hmm?' Dean wandered over and glanced at the figures. _Damn, I think you're probably right._ He felt a cold lump growing in his stomach, and wondered if he was ready to face this. He still felt stiff and his chest ached constantly, hitting him suddenly with sharp pangs if he tried to breathe too deeply. And, quite apart from that, he still felt vulnerable mentally from the demon's last series of attacks. He didn't want to come into contact with it again so soon. On the other hand, _Sam's_ desire to kill the thing had only been increased by the recent damage it had caused. Dean could see this, and despite his disquiet, he would also be glad to be rid of the thing.

'I'll start packing,' he said eventually. 'You start thinking about where the hell we'll get hold of pure gold.'

Sam grimaced at the reminder. _Our next problem. _Fake credit cards were useful, but it was risky to use them for anything too extravagant. Somehow, they needed to find cash.

'What do we have that's worth anything?' he wondered aloud, gazing around their scattered possessions in search of inspiration. _Well… a lot of weapons… silver bullets? But who would want to buy them? Might cause awkward questions, anyway… and then there's…_

'The Colt'

Dean looked up. 'What?'

'Well, it's a real antique… gotta be worth something, if we find the right dealer.'

'We don't have it…' Dean hadn't noticed its absence until now, but he had sorted through the trunk of the Impala, and, he now realised, he hadn't seen it.

'I saw Dad throw it into the woods that night, after… it must still be there.'

'The cops will have searched the area…'

'We would've heard about it, if they'd found it.'

Dean nodded. 'You might have a point. So…. We go back. But we should hurry,' he added, pointing at the laptop's screen, from which the Georgian weather report was still glaring.

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An hour later, having packed up their belongings and checked out of the motel, Dean was driving the Impala slowly along a familiar tree-lined road, scanning the view carefully for the track leading to the cabin and the nearby site of the ambulance crash. Sam, beside him, was fidgeting nervously, his earlier bright mood replaced by a gnawing feeling of trepidation.

'There's the turning,' Sam pointed out, his voice slightly hoarse.

Dean nodded silently. 'Must be just along here somewhere, then.'

The wreckage of the ambulance had been removed, but the site was identifiable by the remains of deep tyre tracks and broken branches on the trees, as well as a few smaller pieces of twisted metal which had been left behind when the authorities had cleared away the main body of the ruined ambulance.

Dean pulled over carefully, conscious of the steep slope which began close to the edge of the road. He killed the engine, but, despite the urgency of the situation, neither of them seemed to be in a hurry to get out.

'You ok?' Sam asked softly.

Dean nodded and grunted. 'You?'

'Yeah,' Sam replied. It was half a word, half a sigh. 'I just… it's not a good place.'

Dean nodded again. He clapped a reassuring hand on Sam's shoulder, then quickly opened the door and climbed out, slamming it heavily behind him. Sam followed more slowly.

The brothers picked their way cautiously down the slope, which was uneven, partly dry dirt that gave way under their feet in streams of sand, partly tufts of brown, stringy grass. The sky beat down an oppressive grey, and in the woods at the bottom of the incline, trees cast heavy shadows.

They split up, wandering among the trees, eyes fixed on the ground. The Colt, Sam reasoned, could be anywhere within throwing distance of the crash site, but was unlikely to be outside a radius of maybe 100 feet, unless it had been carried off by a squirrel or something. The search was slow and dull, and Sam was beginning to wonder whether the gun had already been picked up, maybe by a passing hiker. A dark grey gleam caught his eye; and he uncovered the object with the toe of his boot. It was a piece of slate. He kicked it angrily, and above his head, a bird took flight, cawing in surprise.

To Sam, the area was unpleasantly full of memories. He could glance at a tree and think _I was looking at that tree that night, because I was trying to avoid watching Dean dying._ He found it unsettling, and it made him edgy, so that when Dean tapped him on the shoulder, his heart leaped into his mouth.

'Oh, Jesus Christ, Dean…' he objected.

Dean smirked. 'Going a bit deaf, there, Grandma? I called you.'

'You found anything?'

'Maybe'

'Maybe?'

'Yeah.' He held up the gun. Its three week period in the wild hadn't changed the Colt much, but it was dusty, and was showing spots of rust. Back in the Impala, Sam cleaned the mud out of the barrel and oiled it meticulously.

'There might be some paint in the trunk you could use to cover the rust,' Dean suggested.

'Wouldn't that be a bit... you know... dishonest?'

Dean shrugged. 'It'll be worth more.'

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The next town they came to, they drove up and down the main streets in search of a suitable antique shop. Knowing that the gun, though rare, was probably not worth as much as any significant amount of pure gold, Dean was hoping to find a dealer with a particular enthusiasm for guns, who would be willing to make a slight loss in order to own the Colt. As a result, he rejected the first few stores Sam pointed out.

'There's one'

Dean glanced over. 'No.'

'Why the hell not? We don't have a lot of time, Dean.'

'He's got a window full of furniture. He's not interested in guns.'

Sam fell silent for a few minutes. They had come out of the main shopping area into a labyrinth of narrow back streets lined with boarded up shops. They turned a corner, and Sam piped up again.

'There, look.'

Dean looked. It was a dusty little shop, exhibiting a jumbled mess of items in the window, including furniture, ornaments and strange objects whose use Dean could only guess at. In pride of place, in the centre of the display, were an old French musket and a 16th century pistol, both polished until they shone.

'That'll do'

The shop was dirty and untidy, full of ancient junk which could only be called 'antique' because it was so old that it had begun to fall apart.

'Hello?' Dean called hesitantly. 'Probably the first customers in about ten years,' he muttered to Sam.

'Look at this.' Sam was holding a heavy table ornament, made out of what could be gold or brass, it was hard to tell through the dust. It was a little sculpture of a winged child driving some kind of chariot attached to four horses. It was so flamboyant and hideous that Dean wondered what kind of person would ever want to put it on their table. The whole thing was around the size of his hand.

'Conversation piece?' he suggested, making a face at Sam.

Sam rubbed a thumb across its surface, pushing aside the dust.

'It's gold'

'Yes, indeed. Pure gold,' agreed a high pitched, elderly voice behind them. The proprietor, a skinny man of about seventy with enormous pale eyes, translucent skin and thick-rimmed glasses, shuffled eagerly into the shop. 'I've had it for a very long while, now. Not much market for it.'

'It's the most tasteless example of late Victorian sculpture I've ever seen,' Sam commented disdainfully, clunking it down on a table.

'I'm afraid I have to agree. Are you an expert?'

'A dealer.'

'Oh? Here to buy?'

'Possibly. Or even to sell. I have an extremely rare Colt revolver, in excellent condition. But I haven't had it long, and I'd like to hang on to it unless I get a tempting offer.'

Dean turned his back, impressed by his brother's performance, but also tempted to laugh.

The little man's eyes brightened up, and he stood up straighter, but tried to keep the excitement out of his voice. 'I'm interested.'

Sam took out the Colt. He had worked on it thoroughly in the car until there was no rust to be seen and it appeared to be in finer condition than it had been when it had first fallen into the Winchesters' hands. The antique dealer drew in a long, awed breath.

'I've never seen an example quite like this before,' he breathed, extending his fingers towards it as though he were afraid to actually touch it. 'How much do you want for it?' he added, with such a note of reckless desire in his voice that Sam was inspired to be ambitious with his asking price.

'Ten thousand.'

The man's eyebrows shot up, and his face fell in tragic disappointment.

'I'm sorry, I can't afford that kind of money. Do you really think you'll get ten thousand for it?' he asked, disbelief filling his voice.

Sam hadn't the faintest idea _how_ much he should expect to get for it.

'Well, yes. This particular model is actually unique.'

The man's eyes were filled with longing, clearly, antique guns were his passion. 'Are you sure you wouldn't accept… say… six thousand?' he asked hopefully.

Sam shook his head, hard faced. 'No. I'm quite interested in old guns myself, so I'm not too anxious to sell it.'

The dealer spread his hands in defeat, and Sam turned and headed for the door, then suddenly stopped and turned back.

'Would you be willing to exchange it for this ornament?' he asked suddenly. The dealer looked from Sam to the ornament and paused. The part of him which was an expert knew, despite Sam's ambitious pricing, that the gold statuette was worth more than the Colt revolver. But the part of him which was an enthusiast wanted the Colt more than anything, and argued that he would never sell the extravagant, gaudy monstrosity if he lived a thousand years. Another part of him wondered what on Earth this young man wanted it for, when he had described it as tasteless himself. Despite the inner debate, it didn't take him long to reach a decision, and he stuck his hand out.

'Done'

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Don't have time to write a long author's note, but I should warn you here that I will kill a character before the end of this story. I don't want anyone to stop reading, but I thought I should put a warning.


	8. Chapter 8

Thanks for reviewing, Spooky Claire and angel679. Sorry about that warning at the end of the last chapter – I think it's made it obvious what's going to happen! Still, I wouldn't want to spring it on you unprepared!

**Chapter 8**

Nearly nine hours later, on the road, Sam still looked pleased with himself, even now that he was asleep. Dean was ready to admit that his little brother had put in an impressive and effective performance, but he wasn't sure that it merited eight hours of smug smiles and gloating.

The road was empty; it was nearly 2am, and Dean had his music turned down lower than usual to avoid waking Sam. The result was that Dean was left alone with his thoughts, and he didn't like it.

He had been less disturbed by the return to the crash site than he had expected to be. The surroundings had been familiar only in the vaguest way, like something half-remembered from a dream. He had been fairly dazed throughout the experience, when he hadn't been unconscious, so he hadn't been aware of the area in any vivid way. The proximity of death was something he dealt with on a regular basis, so for him, that particular event had not been as traumatic as he suspected it had been for Sam. Even when his own father had pointed a gun at him and fired, all he had had to face was death. It was Sam who had been threatened with the terrible fate of having to pick up the pieces and live on. All things considered, the events at the crash site hadn't been too bad for Dean. The cabin, however, was a different story.

He wasn't prone to nightmares like his brother, but the memory of what had happened in that damn cabin wouldn't leave him alone. Every night, in one way or another, it came back to him. Sometimes it was just the demon's words, echoing in his head as he lay in the silent motel room trying to fall asleep. Other times he would relive the whole scene from beginning to end, as real as it had been the first time.

Also echoing in his head was the voice of his father, panicking down the phone as if the demon were coming for him that very moment. Dean shifted nervously, wondering, too, exactly what they would find in this little Georgian town.

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They arrived early in the morning, relieved to see that there were no houses in blackened ruins so far. The town was still and peaceful, in the 5am lull between the irresponsible citizens going to bed, and the responsible hardworking ones waking up. Luckily, even at such a time in a fairly small town, there was a gas station willing to fill up the Impala and sell coffee.

Running on caffeine, Dean woke up Sam and thrust the ugly antique into his hands.

'You're gonna have to melt this down and… bless it, or whatever you do. As many bullets as you can get out of it.'

Sam blinked, struggling to compute this amount of information so soon after waking up. After a few seconds, he caught up, and nodded.

'Find somewhere out of the way, so you don't get awkward questions.'

'What are you going to do?'

'Same thing as we did in Salvation. Find a baby who's six months old in the next few days.'

Sam nodded. 'Okay. Call me if you find anything.'

'Mmhm,' Dean muttered, then left, walking confidently up to the door of the small local hospital.

Sam stored the gold statuette in an inner pocket of his jacket; when he stood up he could feel the heavy, uneven lump weighing down one side of the coat so that it hung oddly against him. He walked out of the town, searching for a secluded spot even though there was nobody around at this time of the morning. At the edge of the town, he found an area of common land, sparsely furnished with dying trees and dry fallen branches.

He built a small but fierce fire, and carefully balanced a crucible over it. It had been a long while since he had moulded silver bullets. According to John, it was a precise art: every twig should be strategically placed to make the fire as hot as possible. Sam scoured his memory for the long ago lessons, cursing whatever fact of chemistry caused gold to have a higher melting point than silver. It was the first time he had ever heard of gold being used as a weapon, and he still harboured some doubts as to whether it would be effective. However, he thought, it had to be worth a try.

The ornament was glowing brightly after several minutes, and then, finally, the contorted shapes of the angel and horses began to distort and blur, the details crumbling away until it became no more than a blob of bright metal, and eventually sank down into a pool of liquid. Sam took out the wrought iron mould that they had used before with molten silver and gradually dripped the bright liquid into the holes.

The sculpture produced seven bullets, and Sam was left with a speck of cooling gold the size of a pea, which he left on the sandy ground. _One day some homeless man can find it and buy himself a room for the night…_he fantasised.

It took nearly an hour for the bullets to cool enough for Sam to pick up, but when he returned to the Impala, Dean was still missing, and he had the keys. Realising that his brother's task could take a while yet, Sam wandered off and checked them into the nearest motel. He doubted that they would get much sleep that night, but it could be helpful to have somewhere to crash when they were finished. And, in any case, there might not be any child turning six months old for several days.

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It was nearly six and almost dusk by the time Dean called, and Sam wasn't best pleased to have been kept waiting all day long.

'You couldn't have called and said… I don't know, that it was taking longer than you expected, or something?'

'Alright, I'm sorry. The records are a mess, it took me ages to persuade them to show me, and longer to sort through them.' _And I kept pausing so I could call dad and listen to that damned voicemail over and over again…_

'Did you find anything?'

'A couple possibilities. But if the kid wasn't born at that particular hospital…' he trailed off. It was all too likely that the targeted baby was not in the records he had searched. 'Couldn't you have a vision or something?' he asked hopefully.

'Apparently not.'

'Alright, meet me… Elbark Avenue. We're gonna have to talk to the families, see which is most likely. _See if any of these kids are showing signs of being… special._

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Dean had found three babies who would be six months old, one that night, two the following night. They visited all three families, but in the gathering dark, the young parents were reluctant to talk much with two uninvited strangers on their doorstep. By the time they moved on to the third house, the first two babies having shown no sign of special abilities (either gurgling amiably up at them or wailing incessantly from a back room); it was full dark, and nearly eight o'clock. This family lived in a different part of town, and it took them some time to find the right road. As a result, by the time they arrived, it was long past the hour when respectable visitors would have decided to leave it for tomorrow.

The tall, blonde-pony tailed woman who answered the door eyed them suspiciously with narrow dark eyes.

'What do you want?' she inquired sharply.

'Sorry to bother you so late, ma'am, but we're doing a survey of children born in the last six months…' Sam began smoothly, smiling at her politely. The 'survey' excuse was lame, but Sam hadn't succeeded in thinking of anything better, and, so far, nobody had challenged it. Considering the time, it seemed better to irritate the families by posing as harmless students rather than intimidate them by using a more official-looking ID.

'I'm studying child psychology…' he continued, by way of apology for the bizarre questions he needed to ask. 'Do you feel you can communicate with your child at this early stage? Do you ever feel like… he or she… knows what you're thinking? Has anything ever happened around him or her' -('him,' whispered Dean)- 'that you couldn't explain?'

The woman looked bemused, and she answered his questions in impatient monosyllables. Sam stopped talking abruptly when her expression changed to a confused frown, looking past him.

'What…? That's weird…' she murmured. Dean turned to see where she pointed, an icy fist contracting in his stomach. In the house opposite, lights were flickering on and off, though the rest of the houses on the street seemed to have no such problem. Dean seized his brother's arm with cold stiff fingers, his throat suddenly dry.

'Sam…' he croaked.

Sam spun round, his eyes opening wider than Dean had ever seen them. He swallowed hard, then turned urgently back to the confused housewife in the brightly lit doorway.

'Ma'am – quickly –please – does that family have a child the same age as your son?'

'Sam we don't have time…'

'Yes, the same age to within a few days, I think. But my Aaron always cries when he's near her…'

Dean gave up waiting and sprinted across the manicured lawn and the street, narrowly avoiding an estate car, followed closely by Sam, leaving the woman standing, gaping in the doorway.

Dean pulled his gun from the back of his jeans as he ran; the gun he had loaded with Sam's special bullets. _Okay, _he reminded himself shakily, _hit it in the eye…_

The door was locked, and he slammed into it heavily. He swore silently and tried to force it with his shoulder, but succeeded only in making pain explode in his upper arm as Sam skidded to a halt behind him. He stepped back, cursing, and kicked the door, feeling it give slightly. He kicked it again, and the thick wood splintered at the top, weakening it. _One more and it'll go down._ He heard Sam's muffled cry before he saw flames burst out of an upstairs window.

'Oh, no…'

He stood numbly for an instant before he heard the wailing of a man, somewhere in the house. The fire was spreading quickly. Dean kicked the door again anyway. As predicted, it collapsed this time, and he hurtled into the carefully furnished house.

Upstairs, the flames were taking a strong hold. A man in his thirties was cowering in the doorway of a room, his hands held up in front of his face, moaning in disbelief. Beyond him, Dean thought he saw a grey man-shape, but the next second it was just more smoke.

'Come on!' he yelled at the man, but he got no response. Clearly the guy was lost in shock, grief and horror, as oblivious to Dean as he was to the flames that surrounded him.

Dean's eyes stung and watered, his still-fragile chest burning as smoke choked his lungs, and the heat was overpowering. He reached forward and grasped the other man by his upper arm, pulling him down the stairs firmly, not hearing his protests or seeing his stumbles. Sam met them at the foot of the stairs, and together they supported the man out onto the immaculate lawn which was all that remained of his perfect family life.

'Did you see it?' Sam asked breathlessly.

Dean coughed, shaking his head, dropping down onto the grass. 'I don't know,' he croaked. 'I thought I saw it, but it was gone before I saw it properly. We were too late… we missed it… that poor guy's lost his whole family.'

'The baby?' Sam asked, horrified.

'I don't know,' Dean replied brokenly. 'There was no way to get into the room.'

Sam sat down next to him, staring into the flames, feeling the weight of failure settle onto his shoulders. He glanced over at the man from the house, who was slumped on the grass, almost catatonic. _Another broken family to join the ranks. Compared to him, even we were lucky._

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Seems like a good place to stop. There will either be one long chapter to go or two shorter ones, plus an epilogue. We're coming towards the end. Please review.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

There was nothing they could do, the demon had already disappeared, and the damage was done. After the emergency services arrived, the Winchesters returned to their motel. Neither of them was much in the mood for conversation, or for sleep. So Sam, more to avoid thinking than out of zeal, returned to his laptop and searched for the next town on the demon's agenda, although, as it had only just left, it was unlikely to be having any effect on another town yet. Dean, also restless, paced up and down for a while, then tried to sleep, and failed, and sat fidgeting, lost in his thoughts. Early in the morning, he went out, mumbling an incomprehensible excuse to Sam on his way out the door.

Somehow, a late-working journalist had recorded last night's incident in time for the new edition of the local paper. Dean picked up a copy, and took it unread back to the motel. He wasn't sure whether or not he really wanted to read it.

Sam had finally given up on the laptop and pushed it away. He was sitting slumped, resting his elbows on the table, and he didn't even look up when Dean re-entered the room and lowered himself down opposite.

Dean's chest was hurting more than it had in over a week; he guessed the smoke hadn't helped. He put the newspaper down in front of him, and, although he had come to the conclusion that he really _didn't_ want to know what it had to say, his eye was drawn to it, and once he started to read it, he couldn't look away.

'_House fire kills three'_

'_A resident has been arrested by the police following a fire, believed to be deliberate, which killed his wife and six-month old baby. Roger Alresford, 32, seemed to be in shock after he was pulled from his burning house by a stranger, who was not available for interview. However, after the blaze was extinguished, it was found that Mr Alresford's wife, Mandy, 29, had a stomach wound which she did not receive in the fire. The body of their daughter, Amy, has not yet been recovered. In addition, a third body was discovered in the ruins: that of an unidentified man, whom Alresford claimed not to recognise. 'I don't know who he was, or how he got there,' he protested when questioned. This man was not killed in the fire, but had sustained a wound to the throat, possibly as much as a day before the fire started._

_'A neighbour, Elizabeth Formarks, 30, commented 'I'm shocked, but I always found Roger a little odd. My Aaron (also 6 months old) always cries when he's nearby… I don't see who else could have done it; he was the only one in the house.'_

_'Alresford is currently being held at the local police station, and his behaviour has apparently been quiet and co-operative, though a police spokesman commented: 'he's unresponsive, and if we can get him to talk, he denies everything and starts talking nonsense.'_

_'As for the mysterious body, the police are requesting help from anybody who thinks they can identify him: please report to the police station.'_

Dean pushed the paper away violently. The emphatic movement got through to Sam, and he looked up to find his brother pale and trembling.

'What?'

Dean waved a hand weakly in the direction of the article, and Sam picked it up. After a few moments, Dean found his voice, although it was hoarse and shaky.

'They found a third body in that house, Sam… an "unidentified man"'

Sam just looked confused. 'That's weird,' was his only comment. His face showed sympathy for the man who had been arrested, and the painful knowledge that the man was living in an authentic hell from which they couldn't save him . Dean searched his brother's eyes, but saw only pity, no trace of the dread which was gnawing away at his own insides. He realised that he had never told Sam about the phone call; Sam had no reason to suppose… to fear…

'We need to go to the morgue… see this… body.' He barely whispered the last word.

Sam looked surprised at his urgent tone. He shrugged. 'Ok, if you think it'll help us work out where it's going…'

Dean said nothing, snatched the car keys off the bed and headed straight out the door. Sam picked up his jacket and hurried after him.

Sam knew better than to ask, but he worried as Dean drove to the morgue, speeding along the roads and taking corners with a reckless vehemence. His face was rigid and unreadable, and he wouldn't say a word. It was obvious to Sam that there was something he didn't know about, causing Dean's panic, but he resolved not to ask – something told him that all would be made clear when they arrived at their destination.

Striding up to the reception desk, flashing an ID – he hadn't checked which one it was, so he flashed it quickly – Dean immediately made it clear that he wouldn't put up with any time-wasting.

'I need to see the body from the Alresford house,' he stated abruptly. The middle aged woman behind the desk hesitated, but Dean raised an impatient eyebrow at her, and she gave up.

'Room 18. That way.'

Dean set off, and Sam scurried along after him, down the corridor, round the corner, through the door.

Something collapsed inside Dean when he lifted the cloth covering the dead man's face. Despite his suspicions, he had spent the drive trying to convince himself that he might not be right. He had held on to the hope that he was wrong, but now the truth was right in front of him, and he had nothing to hold on to. He staggered back and leaned heavily against the wall of the bare little room.

Sam had stopped in the doorway without even closing the door. He stepped forward as if in a trance, and the sprung door slammed loudly.

'Oh my God… but you knew…how did you know?' he asked, whispering.

_Sorry Sam. I should have warned you. I thought I could protect you from this._

Sam walked slowly towards the body, eyes fixed on the familiar face, frozen and alien in death. Unsurprisingly, he was pale, and the wound on his neck had faded from the vivid red of blood to a hideous, angry purple. His mouth was slightly open in his slack face, so he looked mildly surprised about something. His eyelids were drooping but not closed, so the glint of an empty dark eye could be seen through his eyelashes. IN many ways, his face was stuck in an expression so different from any he had ever worn in life that he could be another person.

'How did you know?' Sam repeated, not letting Dean avoid the question. After a pause, Sam turned and fixed his brother with a stare, and Dean reluctantly volunteered an answer.

'He called. You were asleep. Gave me that website. But he sounded like he was freaking out… I never heard him sound so freaked… Like he was saying goodbye.'

Sam digested the information as Dean lapsed back into stunned silence. Various reactions clamoured for attention. Sympathy, for the burden Dean had carried alone. Sadness, because after all, John had at least called to say goodbye. Envy, because he hadn't been the one to hear it. And anger. Anger won.

'Why the hell did you wait until _now_ to tell me?'

_Because I didn't want you to worry._

_Because I couldn't have that conversation._

_Because we needed to focus._

_Because there's nothing we could have done._

_Because, if I told you it had happened, how could I pretend that it hadn't?_

He shrugged. Shook his head. Words wouldn't come.

Sam turned abruptly away from him, to their father's body, and gently closed his cold eyelids with two fingers. A scrap of paper caught his eye, poking subtly out of one of the pockets in John's jacket. He frowned. Their dad carried a varied selection of objects on his person, but they rarely included notes.

'Dean'

Sam pulled the note carefully from the pocket and spread it out for both of them to read. The handwriting was unfamiliar – not John's. It was short:

_Alton, West Virginia. Ropley family. We'll finish this._

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'You know it's a trap'

_Yes, of course it's a trap._

Dean only grunted. He glanced away from the road to find Sam still watching him earnestly.

'Well?'

'Yes, probably.'

Sam wasn't satisfied. 'You're just gonna go where _it_ tells us to go?'

Silence.

'What about Dad, we just leave him in that morgue?'

_He's dead, Sammy, what else can we do?_

More silence.

'Dean!'

Sighing in exasperation, Dean pulled over and turned to look at his brother. 'Look, what do you suggest? If you have a plan, I'd love to hear it, because, honestly? I'm drawing a blank.'

Sam sat thinking for a moment with his mouth hanging open.

'I… just don't think it makes sense, going to West Virginia. It wasn't Dad's writing. We'd be playing into its hands.'

Dean nodded. He agreed, but he had nothing else to go on; West Virginia seemed as good a place to go as any other. He would have given almost anything to have somebody tell him what he should do. Sam expected him to know where they were going, but he had never felt so lost. He was willing to follow any instructions he was offered, even if they appeared to come from the enemy.

'Ok, Sam… we'll go in this direction until we find a motel. Then you can get on your computer and check your weather reports, and tell me where we're going next. But… just keep an eye on Alton, West Virginia for me, ok?'

Sam's sullen expression dissolved into sad acceptance. 'Alright.' He had a concerned look in his eyes – Dean hoped he hadn't allowed his helplessness to be heard in his voice.

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The motel was small, dirty and cheap, decorated in grim colours and disturbing patterns that seemed to swirl when Dean looked at them out of the corners of his eyes. Sam was absorbed in his research, face lit strangely by the luminous computer screen, bright in the dingy room. Dean was once again idle, waiting, sleepless, left to dwell on thoughts he would rather avoid.

His father was dead. The lifeless face was there every time he closed his eyes, so denial was no longer an option, but he still struggled to feel anything as pure and easy as grief. He was shocked to find a part of him was relieved. In some ways, having seen the body and knowing for certain was better than the agony of wondering what might have happened. And it was a relief to tell Sam, because hiding things from him was exhausting.

There was a nagging claw of guilt in the back of his mind, whispering to him that he should have tried harder, that, despite his efforts, the family was pulling itself apart. And there was guilt for not telling Sam the truth earlier, letting him unprepared into the room where their father's body lay. He was worried that Sam wouldn't trust him in future. And he felt directionless; now he and Sam were just two travellers with no connection to anyone else. If they died fighting this demon, who would know? _Who would care?_ It would be easy to sink into despair.

And yet, beneath it all, there was a slow-burning anger directed at the demon; a desire for revenge which gave him a purpose to hold on to. For the moment it was buried, and he just felt numb, but he knew that, when he next came face to face with the demon, it would surface.

Dean couldn't say for certain whether he slept that night or not. Grubby morning sunlight was filtering through the grey curtains by the time Sam broke the silence.

'Dean – there's been an electrical storm.'

'Where?'

Sam took a deep breath. 'Alton, West Virginia'

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I have no idea if there is a town called Alton in West Virginia. Anything 'factual' in this story is entirely made up. Most of the names of people and places in these last few chapters have been names of towns around the city of Winchester in England. One chapter and an epilogue to go. Hope you liked. Please review!


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

Alton, West Virginia was small, affluent and quiet, with gently curving residential streets full of identical white-painted houses. The brothers had wandered around, asking passers-by where the Ropley family lived, with apologetic smiles and claiming to be distant relations, and the information had been readily yielded. In the early afternoon, they found themselves seated in the Impala around the corner from the tidy family home, contemplating their next move.

'I don't see why it can't just disappear to escape these bullets just like it did in Salvation with the Colt,' Sam argued, studying his fingers with apparent interest. Surprised that they were still when he felt like they should be trembling.

'Could we trap it? ...that symbol we used to trap Meg,' Dean suggested, his voice quieter than usual but under control. Now that they were here, it was easier to focus.

'Probably. I mean... it would work... but I don't think this demon would just walk into it… and anyway, we'd somehow have to get into the house in advance to draw the symbol on the floor or ceiling. And that family might freak out if they see that we've drawn it, and rub it off.'

Dean tilted his head in acceptance. 'Good point.' After a pause he added: 'Would the symbol still work if it was… umm… under the carpet, or something?'

'Yes, it should.'

'Well, how do we get in the house?'

Sam bit his lip – it was another problem, but at least this was familiar territory. 'So… the truth… not an option?'

'All things considered…no.'

Another silence filled the Impala as both Winchester brothers considered the problem.

'We could say we were there to… mend… something,' Sam suggested weakly.

'You have to call out repair men, Sam; people get suspicious if they just turn up.'

Yet another silence. Eventually, Dean brightened up, and selected an ID carefully from his collection. A few minutes later, they were ringing the doorbell.

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'Good afternoon, ma'am,' Dean greeted the young brunette who opened the door with a bright smile. 'We're from the wildlife service.' The ID was well-faked, so he held it up long enough for her to read thoroughly. _Look, I'm clearly trustworthy. _'Residents in your area have been complaining of a problem with wasps. Nests have been found in three houses close by, and we've been dispatched to check that they haven't resettled in any of the other homes on the street.' He waved a hand to indicate himself and Sam, still smiling in what he hoped was a friendly but professional manner.

She smiled back, all but convinced. 'You don't have any equipment,' she observed, not entirely sure what sort of equipment would be needed to dispose of a wasps' nest, but vaguely aware that there should be some.

'Well, at this stage we just need to search the house. Most likely the herd has moved on, but, you know, just to be safe…'

'Yes, of course.'

'Is this a good time?'

'Yeah, sure. Come in. I'll be in the kitchen there, give me a yell if you need anything.'

'Thank you.'

As they passed the door, Sam observed that the baby was secured in a plastic chair, gurgling happily as it watched its mother cooking. _Good, the room will be empty…_

Upstairs, out of earshot, Sam turned to his brother accusingly.

'A _herd_ of wasps, Dean?'

'Hey, it worked, didn't it?' Dean hissed back.

Sam rolled his eyes, shaking his head in disbelief at what Dean could get away with when talking to women. It never ceased to amaze him.

They had to move some furniture in order to get the carpet up in the sky-blue nursery. They couldn't access the area right beside the cot without taking all the furniture out the room, so they had to settle for a spot several metres away from where the baby would be sleeping. Despite their caution, the young mother called up the stairs when she heard the racket they were making as they shifted a bookcase.

'Is everything alright?'

Dean walked out into the hallway to reassure her, leaving Sam sketching carefully on the exposed floorboards.

'Oh, yeah. Just checking all the corners… for... wasps. We're nearly finished, actually. Pretty sure you got nothing to worry about.' _Except that all this could be just so much ashes by tomorrow, including you. _He shuddered at the thought of her plump, happy face losing everything, having her family torn apart like the Alresfords, back in Georgia. Like the Winchesters.

'Are you ok?'

'Huh?'

'You want some water, or anything? You looked… kinda pale, for a moment there.'

'Oh… thanks, but I'm fine.'

He smiled at her again, but his trademark grin had lost some of its wattage. He disappeared back into the nursery, and found Sam easing the carpet back into place over the chalk lines.

'Is it done?' Dean hissed.

'Yeah.'

'You sure it's right?'

'Positive.'

'We can't let it win this one, Sam… can't let it take this family.'

Sam looked up at his brother's anguished face. He thought of the amount of damage the demon had done over the years. He remembered Roger Alresford, standing trial for murdering his wife and daughter. _We can't let it destroy any more lives._ 'And we won't,' he added aloud.

He studied Dean's face, and watched as the complicated expression of suffering turned into something like determination.

'We won't,' Dean echoed, in a bare whisper.

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After they left the house, there was little to do other than wait. Dean emptied and reloaded his gun, just to be sure. A couple of hours later, he checked it again. Even after that, it took some effort not to keep looking every few minutes, just to be sure. Sam, too, was restless and nervous. He fidgeted incessantly, tried to read but failed to concentrate. One way or another, something told him it would be over tonight, and the waiting was unbearable – having the end in sight, but just out of reach, with nothing to do other than sit tight until the moment came.

They watched as the young woman's husband arrived home and greeted his family with warm, affectionate smiles. Long hours late, darkness fell. The young couple put the baby to bed together and then helped each other cook, finally settling to relax in front of the TV. The lights in the house were extinguished one by one, until only a couple remained. The Winchesters, watching the house's windows from the safety of the car, were all but holding their breath. In Georgia, it had all been over by ten. It could be here at any moment. Minutes passed slowly, each one charged and uncomfortable with tension.

'I guess maybe it's not coming tonight,' Sam suggested eventually, sighing heavily. 'She didn't say exactly how old her baby was… or we could have the wrong house.'

'It's the right house,' Dean replied, frowning. 'But it could be the wrong night,' he admitted.

'It's not,' Sam answered suddenly, his voice catching painfully in his throat. Dean spun round, taking in the flickering lights in the windows of the shadowy house. He felt like he should offer some words of encouragement or advice before going into battle, but he didn't have enough breath in his throat to form words, so he only nodded, trying to convey the same message in a brief look.

The brothers sprinted towards the house. Dean thanked whatever God might be watching when he found the door unlocked. The husband, slumped in front of the TV, leapt up with an angry yell when two strangers burst into his house uninvited.

'What the hell?' he demanded.

'Please – we don't have time to explain, but we want to help – please just trust us,' Sam tried to soothe him breathlessly.

'I don't need your help, get out of my house!' the man objected furiously.

A scream from upstairs contradicted him, and both brothers sprinted towards the stairs, followed closely by the clumsy footsteps of the confused, frightened man. In the sky-blue nursery, a familiar scene was being played out. The demon, yellow eyed, grey faced and grinning, standing by the cot, looking down at the helpless baby which was lying beside it and wailing unheeded into the stunned silence. The young woman from earlier was standing immobile up against the wall, her friendly face twisted into a mask of horror.

The Winchesters slipped past her into the room. Dean's hand moved too fast to see, seizing the gun from the back of his jeans, but as he aimed the demon finally spun round, stepping towards him, waving a hand angrily. Dean found himself on the floor, struck by an invisible, powerful force which left him winded, his gun sliding away across the carpet.

'You're back for more, are you?' it jeered, in a voice which could never have belonged to any human person. 'I thought I'd given you enough to think about, but you just keep coming back.'

Dean tried to scramble to his feet, but was hit suddenly by a peal of agony more intense than anything he had known, slicing through every cell of his body at once, and he dropped back to the floor with a cry. The pain was gone as soon as it had come, leaving no visible damage. Dean rolled over and crawled towards his discarded gun.

Although its attention seemed to be on Dean, the demon had not released the young woman from her intangible bonds. Her husband, who had been watching from the doorway, had backed away into the hall, and was clinging to the stair rail as though he would collapse if he let it go. Sam stood frozen, aiming his own gun at the demon from across the room, but unable to get a clear shot at its eye from his current position and aware that if he shot it before it was secured by the symbol, it could disappear in the time it took the bullet to leave the barrel.

The demon advanced slowly on Dean, who was propped on his elbows in the corner, blocked by the wall from backing away any further. 'Looks like I might pick up a Winchester as well as this kid tonight,' it taunted, glancing over its shoulder at Sam. 'Your daddy was doing better than this,' it added twisting its lips into a cruel smile. 'He'd nearly got me back in Georgia, had a plan and everything. But he started freaking out when the lights in his hovel kept flickin' on and off hours after the storm was finished. I've used his body before, you'll remember, so it was easy to get inside him again, I know how he works. He was thinking of his boys when he cut his own throat. He'd want you to know that. His body was dead when it walked into that house. I left it there so he could be reunited with his boys one last time.' It seemed to be enjoying its bragging, speaking rapidly in a charged whisper, still grinning so manically that its smile bisected its face.

Dean looked up at it with hard eyes as it began to take another step towards him, raising a hand to conduct another attack. But the attack never came, and the demon halted abruptly, its malicious grin freezing and then crumbling into ugly, hissing fury.

The woman fell to her knees sobbing as she was released. Dean climbed slowly to his feet, picking up his gun as he did so, and straightening until he stood eye to eye with the thing that had killed both his parents, less than a foot between them.

Across the room, bright lights exploded in Sam's head, and he dropped his weapon, clutching both hands to his temples. Uncertainty flickered in Dean's eyes.

'I can still get him… in his head, he's always been vulnerable to me,' spat the creature, glaring pure hatred into Dean's eyes.

'Can't get anything if you're _dead_,' Dean spat back, matching the barrel of his gun to the beam of dim yellow light emitted by the creature's eye. He fired, and the shot rang out, deafening over the baby's wailing and its mother's sobs, cancelling out all other sound.

For a second, Dean wondered if it had worked as the demon stood whole before him. But the yellow lights faded and went out, and then the grey face and shadowy body disintegrated and crumbled into dust at his feet.

A sense of the surreal took over Dean, as he stood staring into the ashes. _After all this, have we _really _come to this moment?_ He wondered, stunned. He couldn't remember a time when the creature hadn't been a persistent threat, in the background, an ever-present fear. Could it really be lying in ashes on a sky-blue carpet?

Across the room, Sam was straightening from a crouch, his face full of shock and a kind of demented happiness.

_Is it over?_

_Yes, it's over._

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Really, really hope you liked this chapter. Epilogue to come, just to tie up loose ends, then we're done. Review, _please!_

xx


	11. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

With confused thanks and tight smiles, the frightened family hustled the Winchesters out of their house. Sam was surprised that they asked for no explanation and wanted no questions answered about what had happened. They didn't demand to know what had attacked them or why, nor how the brothers had known it was coming. They just thanked them politely for whatever it was they had done, and got rid of them as quickly as possible.

'It's weird,' Sam reflected later, sitting back in the Impala with his eyes closed. 'After we were attacked… Dad wanted to know everything about what did it. But those people…'

'They just want to forget,' Dean interrupted, finishing Sam's thought. 'Dad lost Mom… nothing was ever going to be the same. But they can just pretend nothing happened and go back to life like before. It's easier. We couldn't do that.'

Sam nodded, considering. _He's right._ Then his lips curved into a smirk. 'When did you get so damned insightful?'

Dean looked up at his brother, almost surprised to see him smiling, after everything that had happened. Then, all at once, he could feel the freedom of a long quest finally fulfilled settling into him, and he grinned. 'Yeah, whatever…'

Sam settled further back in his seat. 'I could sleep for… I don't know. Ages,' he muttered.

Dean grunted his agreement. 'Motel?' he suggested, starting the engine.

'Motel,' agreed Sam, without opening his eyes.

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It was late afternoon in the next day when they finally woke up. Too tired to do anything other than collapse fully clothed onto the twin beds, they had left the blinds open, and they woke to find the room bathed in soft, golden sunlight.

Something was nagging in the back of Dean's mind, and gradually a memory surfaced, of a conversation in Chicago, what seemed years ago. At the time, it hadn't seemed so important – 22 years after their mother's death, 'when we've killed the demon' had begun to seem an imaginary time which would never really exist. At that point, Dean had begun to suspect that they might never rid the world of the thing. But now it was gone, and the half-forgotten conversation was suddenly vitally important. Feeling a certain amount of apprehension, Dean voiced the inevitable question:

'So, what do we do now?'

Sam was caught unprepared by the question. He, too, recalled the words they had exchanged in Chicago. He thought about going back to school. 'Normal life'… the phrase sounded strange and alien in his mind. Somehow, 'normal' lacked the appeal that it had once had.

After it had so nearly been lost, family seemed the most important thing to hold on to. With John gone, Dean was all he had left, and he was all Dean had. His brother's brush with death in the cabin had made Sam realise that a life without Dean had become inconceivable. He would rather be without 'normal life' than without Dean, any time.

He had been away from school for too long; his friends would be strangers: they belonged somehow to a different world, one that he could not see himself rejoining. After everything that he had been through, the petty concerns of his college life – giving papers in on time, getting enough sleep the night before an exam – seemed trivial and superficial. He had seen too much now to slip back into that life.

Now, despite everything he had said in the past, hunting was all he had left. And yet, it didn't seem so bad. After some moments, he finally gave the answer that he had never expected to hear himself say.

'We go on… find the next hunt. There'll always be something to hunt, right?'

Dean felt himself fill with relief. Part of him wanted to ask what had made Sam change his mind, what had caused this drastic change in his brother's point of view. But then he realised that he didn't need a reason; it was enough just to know that Sam was staying. Somehow, he managed to express everything he was feeling in his short reply to Sam's question.

'Yeah, always.'

_**Fin**_

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Wow, I finished it! ;) Thank you very, very much to everyone who has read all the way to this point, you guys have made my first fanfic a pleasure to write! If you have any thoughts or comments, I'd love to hear them.

This was going to be a one-shot when I wrote the first chapter, but I was persuaded to continue it, and it kind of… grew. The point is, this is a bigger story than I ever intended to write, and I hope I did it justice!

Sally

xxx


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